Traveling with her father afforded her the opportunity to see different places and meet all types of people. Lawrence wasn’t much different from any of the other small towns his route took him through, but she’d long-since stopped worrying about what place they would see. Only the people mattered.
The crowd parted for her as she tried to thread through the throng. One by one, the voices died off. She barely acknowledged their features, their faces bleeding away as she searched for only one. The judge should be in the room. Why wasn’t he here?
“Miss Lang?” A nervous voice shook with concern and a hand caught her elbow. She tried to tug away, but the fingers tightened and pulled her around. The man holding her was familiar. She knew him, but…
“I’m sorry, I’m sure we were introduced. But I’m afraid I don’t quite recall when. Please excuse me, I need to find my father.” Where was he? So many angry people, his decision to hear Mr. Lewis’ case would not go well with at least half of the people present no matter which way he decided.
Her father often talked his cases out with her, and told her she was a reliable sounding board for his legal arguments. Debating the nuances of a case had brought them closer over the last few years—ever since her mother passed away from flux.
He really should be here. She’d run down the alley, determined to warn him.
The man holding her elbow gave it a gentle squeeze. “Miss Lang, I’m Doctor Stewart. The judge introduced us a few nights ago when we had dinner.”
Forced to pay attention again, Evelyn fanned her free hand to try and create some air. It was unbearably warm in the room. “Oh, yes, Doctor Stewart. My apologies. I fear I’m a bit distracted.”
“Of course you are, but I think you should sit down and let me examine you.” Solicitation filled every word, but Evelyn shook her head.
“No, truly. I am fine. I just need to find my father.”
Mrs. Johnson let out a hiccupping sob and Evelyn turned at the sound. Fat, heavy tears rolled down her cheeks. Her son stood just behind Mrs. Johnson—Jeremy—Justin—something. He looked pained, his dark eyes filled with regret. She truly didn’t have time for their sorrow at the moment. Doctor Stewart pulled her back around and tried to usher her from the room. So many people, and yet they all moved away from her, their gazes lowering and more than one pulled off his hat.
Troubled by the odd reactions, Evelyn yanked her arm out of the doctor’s proprietary grip. “Don’t touch me, Doctor Stewart.” Her voice rang out in the sudden silence. She knew everyone looked at her now and they didn’t pretend otherwise. The doctor gave her a pained, if patient, look and she ignored it. “I said I needed to see my father.”
“You don’t want to do that, dear.” He put his hand on her arm once more, but she glared at him until he took a step back.
“I am not your dear, nor someone you need to look after. I am very well aware my father is dead. Murdered in your fine town right in the street, along with the marshal, because they stood up for what they believed in.” She swung her gaze around, an empty satisfaction for all the heads ducking or gazes that shifted to avoid meeting hers. “I want to see my father…now.”
“All right, very well. This way.” Doctor Stewart didn’t try to touch her again, but ushered her out of the main room and down the hall to an office. The tiny, airless room seemed too dark and too somber a place to hold her father. He always had a smile, a thoughtful expression, or an easy jest even in the harshest of times.
The doctor said something to her, but Evelyn shut the door and walked over to the corpse on the table. They’d covered him with a linen sheet. A dark, wet stain soaked through center of the white fabric. A lump filled her throat and she blinked away the watery sheen clouding her vision before tugging the cloth back.
They’d closed his eyes. If not for the caked blood on his chest, he might seem to be sleeping. Sniffing once, she brushed her knuckles against his cheek and then fixed his tie. She could do nothing about his shirt. Tears blurred his image and a splash hit her cheek. He truly was dead.
Leaning down, she pressed a kiss to his forehead—his cool, dry forehead. No life beat in his chest, no warm breath on her cheek as he returned her affection, no soft laugh reminding her why she considered him both a father and a friend. He would never smile at her again, never correct her legal argument, and never debate the finer point of an incisive statement.
Straightening, she sniffled again and steeled herself before reaching into the inner pocket of his jacket. He always carried it with him. Always. Inside, she found the braided leather ties and smooth metal. Tugging it out, she stroked her thumb over the inscription. It wasn’t a language, just a series of symbols, but she knew them all by heart. She’d played with it so often when she was younger, fascinated by the metal and the shapes.
“You could have stopped them, Daddy,” she whispered. And so could I… She could forgive him his failure to do so. He’d sworn off ever using his gift. Never would he wield his power over another for as long as he lived. Whenever it came up in discussion, he repeated it. But she would have no mercy for her own lack of action. She’d hesitated too long, obeyed her father to his dying breath.
Clenching her hand around the metal, she struggled under the weight of her grief. She hadn’t earned the right yet. Not when it was her fault her father lay here, cold and forgotten, in a town that did not know him or care about him. Pressing another kiss to his cheek, she dragged the sheet back over him and knelt down. Someone had put his bag in the room next to the table.
She opened the clutch and rifled through the papers. They would mean next to nothing to the people here, but she understood her father’s notes and the meaning behind the shorthand. Mr. Lewis’ file was last. The last case he’d heard, that he’d ruled on. Knuckling away another tear, she flipped it open and studied each page until she found the one she wanted.
Witnesses—the whole list. Now the man from Tennessee had a name. Ethan Harlow.
The lump in her throat wouldn’t go away no matter how hard she swallowed, so she folded the list of witness names up and tucked it into her sleeve. It took her several minutes to shred the rest of the papers, but she couldn’t carry them out and burn them. Mr. Lewis had gotten away and, if she knew her father, he’d given him a letter to carry in case the issue came up again. Destroying the rest meant no one could change it.
No one could undo what her father had done.
Leaving the remains inside the leather satchel—she couldn’t bear to touch it again—she rose and looked down at her father again. I’m sorry Daddy, but I’m going to break my promise. They killed you and I can’t let them get away with it…
And they would, if she didn’t do anything. She looped the braided leather ties over her head and hid the metal piece under her collar. The map said Texas and that was several days journey at best. Allowing herself one last kiss to her father’s shrouded face, she left the room and reentered the deafening silence of the crowd. Sparing them one long look, she walked out of the meeting hall and made a path for the hotel she and her father used.
In their room, she packed her clothing, taking only as much as she could fit into the two small bags that she could carry. If her maps were correct, she had nearly a thousand miles to travel. It could take months. But she also had enough coin to hire horses and private traps.
The law books would have to stay behind, as would her father’s things. She took only her parents’ wedding rings. He’d kept both after her mother passed away. By afternoon, she waited with her bags at her feet in front of the coach office for the late day stagecoach to carry her south.
Hands folded together in her lap, she focused only on her goal. I need to take back what is mine and, to do that, I need to go to Texas. The metal against her chest stayed cool, but it left its brand nonetheless.
When that was done, then she would allow herself to grieve, but not a moment before. She could almost hear her father’s chiding tone in her ear. Revenge is not justice. She refused to l
isten to it. Her father bleeding into the dust and dying alone was not justice either, it was criminal. Criminals needed to be punished.
Evelyn needed to be the one who punished them. I will take it back, Daddy and I will find them…and they will pay.
Chapter 7
Sam, Flying K Ranch
“How bad will it get?” Sam stood on the hill next to his father. Like the land they ranched and the town they nurtured, his father was made of sterner material—tough as old boot leather and meaner than a rattlesnake when pushed.
“No way to tell.” Jed pushed his hat up. “You going to let her do this alone?” Below them, Scarlett walked toward the cattle carcasses that Micah and Jimmy had pulled together. A dozen of the poor beasts lay out in the cold afternoon sun and the best way to eliminate disease was to burn the remains and section off the area, keep the other cattle away.
“She doesn’t want company right now.” His wife’s reserve of such utter strength left him in awe. She’d listened to Micah, Jed and Sam talk for hours and promised to come down when they needed her. Rather than pretend an understanding of the disease, she’d brought her brother Noah into the conversation.
The healer hadn’t been able to give them much—his gifts worked on people, though he’d been known to bend it toward an animal. He had when Scarlett’s horse had been shot, but he’d argued that was a physical injury he could see and treat. Whatever sickened the cattle, he hadn’t been able to identify.
After a lengthy debate and examination, Jed declared the animals may have been felled by bad grass or some other condition. It didn’t have to be a disaster and so far, the rest of the herd seemed to be fine. They’d monitor the situation—and they’d elected to keep all the cattle in this particular section of the ranch away from the rest until they were certain.
That left only disposing of the bodies—a job uniquely suited to Sam’s firestarting wife. Folding his arms, he waited. She didn’t want him down there for this part of the task, but she’d need him after. He had fresh clothes for her in his saddlebags. Marrying Scarlett was one of the few things to go absolutely right in the last few years—years that had seen the bank emptied of its gold, a virulent spread of the fever, and the death of so many his family had sworn to protect.
He was a marshal without a town. His father had suggested he turn in the star, but with a new Dorado on the horizon and Haven growing by the day, Sam declined that option. The new town would need the marshal and they had enough outsiders coming in with the army fort.
“Samuel…”
“Leave her alone, Pa. Scarlett can handle this.” Accepting his wife meant accepting all of her—the ability to create and snuff fire in her very capable, if slender and delicate hands. She’d taken on a full range fire and snuffed it out. He’d never seen anything so devastatingly dangerous and awe inspiring as the day he’d found her setting one of the bathing ponds on fire in the first weeks he’d known her. But that day on the range…a fist closed around his heart. The sheer enormity of what she’d done…he didn’t think she had any true knowledge of the depth of her strength.
Or the lengths he’d go to protect her and make sure she never felt bad about it. Her beauty and her confidence staggered him, but he knew that beneath it all remained a fragility and terrible fear of failure. She knew the cost of her ability better than any other person and he’d seen first hand the terror in her when her gift lashed out—as had over a dozen men who’d lain in ambush.
She’d burned most of them alive.
“No, I wasn’t going to talk to you about your wife. Our Scarlett is a tough lady and your mother would have liked her.” The use of our wasn’t an accident on his father’s part. Jed’s fondness for Scarlett developed the day Sam brought her to the ranch as a prisoner. He’d only needed to keep her safe from the people in town who wanted to hang her, he’d never dreamed his father would develop a fondness—or set her free and treat her like a guest.
Though Sam couldn’t argue with the idea that his father was often far smarter than he about such things. It took him longer, but catching Scarlett at the bank was the best thing that ever happened to Sam Kane and he wasn’t too proud to admit it.
“Samuel.” His father repeated his name and Sam dragged his gaze from his wife long enough to flick a look of apology to his father.
“Yes, Pa?”
“Have you heard from Kid?” The careful, soft question offered insight into Jed’s feelings on the subject of Sam’s youngest brother.
“No. I doubt I will either.” He hadn’t intended to tack the last line on, but his father needed to gird his expectations.
Below flames began to spread and his wife stood in the torrent. Concern tightened the muscles in his back and shoulders, but Sam refused to look away. The fire was every bit a part of her and he took his vows to her seriously, no matter how often she teased him for the effort. He knew the flames didn’t hurt her, but it didn’t stop the primal need to jerk her out of them, to protect her from her own ability and no matter how terrifying it seemed, she needed him to never turn away. So he wouldn’t.
“Why not?” The slightest of hesitation, the barest quiver of indecision slid along the underbelly of Jed’s question. Before Cobb died, Sam had never seen this side of his father. But loneliness made for a poor companion and he recognized the need to lean on someone, even mildly. Like his wife, his father needed him to be that person.
“Do you want the hard answer or the simple one?” Because the complexity of Kid’s problems defied simple, but he’d already worked out how to present the issue to his father when the matter came up.
“The hard one.” Tension thickened Jed’s voice and Sam kept his gaze on Scarlett, but put a hand on his father’s shoulder.
“You have to let him be the man now.” That was the hard answer. “You have to let him go.”
“He’s not a man…” The immediate protest wasn’t unexpected.
“No,” Sam agreed. “He’s not. We have never allowed him to be.” It had taken him a long time to admit that to himself. Micah reached the conclusion far faster than either Sam or their father. But then Micah had always been closer to Kid, a better brother than Sam or Jason both. Sam saw the child, the scrappy little boy who needed affection and avoided the demands of running the ranch or dealing with the family. He’d seen what he’d wanted to see. “We can’t fix this problem for him, Pa. We can’t take the burden away, we can’t—we can’t make it better.”
“He’s Molly’s baby.” Jed sighed. All of his boys were Molly’s children, but her death right on the heels of delivering Kid had set him apart from the others. When he was younger, he’d resented the preferential treatment that seemed to have earned the youngest Kane. But with age, he’d begun to understand that it hadn’t been so preferential for Kid and in many ways, his youngest brother felt ostracized.
“He’s not a baby, Pa. He hasn’t been for a long time.” Shockingly enough, it had been Cody who’d brought the matter to Sam and confronted him with it. Giving his father’s shoulder a squeeze, Sam let him go. Adjusting his hat, he tugged the brim down to block the glare stabbing at his eyes and increasing the headache boring into his brain.
Below the flames climbed higher, burning nearly a combination of blue, yellow, red and orange. The heat carried toward them on a cold breeze. It had to be intense in the center of the conflagration.
“I can’t get past that it’s Scarlett in the center of that.” Jed murmured, his expression still dark and troubled.
“She can handle it.”
“I know she can handle it.” The snap of approbation in his voice pulled Sam’s attention back to him. “What I want to know is if Kid can.”
Fear.
Jed Kane was afraid. The knowledge was as terrifying as it was humbling. Hard and irascible, tough and smart, Jed governed their lives with firm discipline and tougher principles. He didn’t show his fear, and provided all of them with a sturdy foundation to build upon.
“He can, Pa. Look�
�” he glanced back at the raging fire briefly and then focused on his father. “Scarlett, Cody, Buck—Noah…Quanto raised all of them. He taught them the control they have. Look at Scarlett…I mean really look at her. She’s a mother, and amazing and generous and giving. And right now, she’s standing in the fires of hell and they do what she wants them to do. In a few minutes, I’ll go down there and hold her in my arms and there won’t be a mark on me. Because she won’t allow it. She has control, Kid needs that kind of control and when he has it…he’ll be fine.”
He had to be. Sam would accept no other outcome.
Jed stared at him, as if seeking confirmation of the answer in Sam’s expression. Finally, he nodded and glanced down at his boots. “You’re a good man, Samuel.”
“Thanks, Pa. But I’m the man you made me.” Dry humor, but he meant every word.
“I told Kid I loved him.” The words came out a whisper. “He’d never heard me say it before…I knew that from the look on his face when I told him. But I always thought you boys knew.”
“We did.” But it was different with Kid and they’d all learned very recently how different. The next words would be harder for Jed to hear—harder still for Sam to be the one to tell him. “But you grieve when you look at him Pa, and no matter what you say, Kid’s always known that because he could feel it.”
A haunted look filled Jed’s expression and Sam grimaced.
“Pa, don’t blame yourself. We didn’t know, you never behaved that way toward him and you couldn’t have known…”
“I see your mother when I look at him, Sam. I miss her.” And that admission cost his father to say. “I used to see her in you, but—you grew up fine and strong. Kid’s—Kid’s more like her than any of you.”
“I know that, too.” He remembered his mother better than his brothers. Glancing to his left, the flames were still shooting up into the sky, it took time to burn animals down—and Scarlett needed to blow off steam anyway. She’d been spending a lot of time with Sage, and the amplification showed. Making a mental note of that, he set it aside to deal with later. “The best thing we can do for Kid is trust him.”
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