After Sundown

by Shelly Thacker

  “During the war?” Annie asked.

  “And before that.” He lifted his gaze to hers. “We didn’t grow up with money, you know. St. Charles wasn’t much of a town in those days. Our place was just a cabin in the woods—like the one where you grew up.”

  Annie regarded him in surprise. She had assumed the McKennas always had money. But then, she and James had never discussed their families.

  “Things were never real easy,” Lucas continued slowly, “but times got tougher during the war.”

  Another thing they had in common. Annie remembered how her own life had changed so drastically in those terrible years, after her papa ran off to avoid being conscripted. “Did your father join the fighting?”

  Lucas nodded. “Ma and Pa were northern sympathizers, so that made us unpopular with some folks around St. Charles. When Pa went off to fight...” He glanced away. “He left James and me in charge. Told us to protect the womenfolk.”

  He became quiet, his gaze distant. Annie guessed that he must’ve only been about twelve at the time. James would’ve been about sixteen.

  She didn’t press him for details, didn’t want him to tell her, if the memories were too painful.

  But after a moment he continued. “James was always better at book-learning than I was, and I was a better marksman. So that’s how we divided things up. He took different jobs in town, made good money. Had a knack for that. I looked after the hunting.” His gaze shifted back to his plate. “But toward the end, there wasn’t much money to be made anymore, or much wildlife left in the woods. Not with all the soldiers and deserters and regulators moving through.”

  He halted again, running his thumb along the sharp edge of his knife.

  “One morning,” he said in a low voice, “a pair of soldiers came to the door. Union. Said they had known Pa, said they had food. They were officers, looked real clean and nice. And I...” His jaw hardened. “I let them in. Should’ve known better. It was just me and Ma at home that day.”

  Annie felt her heart beating hard as she saw a dozen emotions cross Lucas’s face.

  “Lucas,” Annie said gently, “what happened to your mother?”

  “I barely shut the door before I heard her... scream.” His breathing was unsteady. “Then one of them hit me with the butt of his rifle. And the next thing I knew, James was waking me up. And the girls were there and they were all crying.” He looked away. “And our... mother was dead. The Union officers stole what little food we had and killed her. For no reason at all. Just killed her.”

  Annie felt tears well in her eyes at the pain she saw in his. “Lucas, I’m so sorry.”

  “I was supposed to protect her.” He swallowed hard. “ ‘Protect the womenfolk.’ That was the last thing Pa said before he left. Last words he ever said to me.” Lucas got up from the table and walked to the fireplace. “When he explained to us why he had to go off and fight, that was what he told us—his favorite words from Psalm 82.”

  Lucas looked down into the flames, his voice becoming rough. “ ‘Defend the weak and the fatherless, do justice to the afflicted and needy, deliver them from the hand of the wicked.’ ”

  Annie blinked hard against the burning in her eyes, understanding only now why Lucas had become a lawman, why he felt so driven to defend and protect people—as he hadn’t been able to protect his mother. “Your father died in the war,” she said gently.

  He nodded. “Shiloh.”

  Her heart ached for Lucas, and for James and their three sisters she’d never met. They’d lost their father and mother, been left orphaned and alone to fend for themselves at a time when Missouri had been torn apart by marauders in both blue and gray. “What did you do?” she whispered. “How did you all manage after that?”

  “James managed,” Lucas said simply. “He took the girls into town, where they’d be safe. I left. That same day.”

  She gasped. “Why?”

  “To hunt them down—the men who killed our mother,” he said, a razor-sharp edge in his voice even after all these years. “Took my rifle and tracked them like the animals they were.” He turned his head toward her, the firelight casting his face in stark shadows. “But I never found them.”

  “Oh, Lucas.” She closed her eyes, unable to bear it. Everything was becoming so painfully clear to her now—why law and justice meant so much to him.

  Because he had never been able to get the justice he sought for his own family, his own loss.

  And that was also why he had been so determined to track down and bring to justice the person who had killed another member of his family. The woman who had taken his brother’s life.

  Her.

  She looked down at her hands in her lap, wringing her napkin. “How old were you when you left them?”

  “Fifteen. Didn’t go home for a long time. Couple of years. By the time I went back, James was already a success in the railroad business, living in a fancy house. I barely recognized the girls. Felt like I didn’t even know them anymore.”

  So James had taken care of his family, while Lucas had chosen to become a lawman, and live apart from them. From everyone.

  It struck Annie that they had that in common: they had both lived solitary lives. But while her isolation had been imposed by others, his was by choice.

  Not because he was unfeeling, as she had once thought... but because he felt so deeply.

  He was afraid to care, afraid to get close to anyone.

  Afraid he would let them down.

  She rose from the table and walked over to him. “And was that when you became a marshal?”

  He nodded. “James helped with that, like he helped everyone with everything.” He halted for a second. The two of them exchanged a glance.

  They both knew James hadn’t helped her when she needed it desperately.

  Lucas couldn’t seem to look at her as she drew closer. “He knew how much I liked it out West, and he knew some people. There was an opening for a deputy U.S. marshal. It went to me. I had some luck fairly early, got a bit of attention. Got promoted.”

  Annie knew he was being modest, just like when he described himself as a “pretty good shot” when the truth was he was lethally fast with a gun.

  He called it “luck” and said he “got a bit of attention” when he had, in fact, methodically hunted down some of the worst, most notorious criminals ever to plague the territories. The earliest articles she had read from Travis’s collection had been written when Lucas was only twenty.

  “And ever since,” she said, “you’ve been trying to protect people. To defend the good people of the world... like your father told you the day he left.”

  He turned toward her, his eyes dark with emotion.

  She shook her head sadly. “And that’s why you want to be able to tell the good people apart from the bad. So you won’t make a mistake.” She reached out to touch his arm. “That’s all it was, Lucas, that day when you were fifteen and you opened that door. A mistake.”

  His muscles tensed beneath her fingers. “I failed them,” he said hoarsely. “All of them. My mother was killed because of what I did. My sisters grew up without a mother because of what I did—”

  “And you’ve been trying to make up for it ever since. Lucas, you’ve done so much good, for so many people. But you’ve never forgiven yourself.” She held his gaze. “And no matter how hard you try, you can’t tell good people apart from the bad just by looking at them. People aren’t like that. They’re just... human. And even the good ones have flaws and weaknesses, and sometimes they make mistakes.”

  His jaw hardened. “Like James?” he asked gruffly.

  Annie couldn’t summon a reply. Her own heart was still full of hurt over the way James had treated her.

  Lucas remained silent for a moment. Then he touched her face. “I’ve tried to understand what he did to you. But I can’t. How could he toss you aside, you and your unborn child?”

  He almost sounded angry at his brother for doing that to her.


  “I-I don’t know why he did it, Lucas.” Annie had been struggling to understand the events of that night herself, for so long. “Maybe he... maybe he was tired and frustrated. Maybe he panicked.” She took a deep breath. “Or maybe he just had one selfish, thoughtless moment. It doesn’t mean he was like that his whole life.”

  Disbelief filled Lucas’s eyes. “You’re defending him?”

  “I’m not defending him, I’m...” Annie searched for the right words, and felt like a weight had been lifted from her heart when she found them. “Understanding him, forgiving him. Lucas, he was a good man. You were right to believe that about him. He was good and kind and generous. But he wasn’t a saint. He was just... human, like anyone else.”

  The disbelief in Lucas’s eyes shifted to a different emotion, something softer and deeper. His fingertips trailed through the wisps of hair that curled along her cheek.

  She lowered her lashes. “He made mistakes. But so have I. It’s... it’s taken me a while to figure it out, but I know what I am—and what I’m not. I know I’m not perfect.” She lifted her chin, her voice steady and strong. “But I’m not what people in St. Charles always told me I was, either.”

  “No,” he whispered. “No, Annie, you’re not.”

  It was the first time he had called her that in weeks, and it made her breath catch. They stood in silence for a moment, surrounded by the silver moonlight shining through the windows and the golden glow from the fireplace.

  When he spoke again, his voice had become hoarse. “There’s something else I’ve been wondering, about that night. Annie, when James tried to take the gun from you...” He paused, searching her face. “Do you think it’s possible he knew you meant to kill yourself?”

  She inhaled a startled breath. “I... I don’t know.” The thought had never occurred to her.

  “You had just told him you were carrying his child, and you were frightened, vulnerable. He had to see that. When he tried to grab that gun out of your hand, maybe he wasn’t trying to save himself—maybe he was trying to save you.”

  Annie shut her eyes, struggling to sort out the images in her memory, but they were blurred by the fear and shock and remorse that had gripped her that night. “All I remember is... I was so scared, and we were shouting at each other, and then...” She shook her head, opening her eyes. “Lucas, it all happened so fast. I don’t know.” She hoped it was true, wished she could be certain, to ease his mind. “We’ll never know. All we can do is—”

  “Forgive him,” Lucas agreed, nodding. “Forgive him. And accept that he was only human.”

  Lucas suddenly looked as if he were exhausted as he walked over to the settee and sank down onto it.

  Annie felt another tug on her heart, remembering that he wasn’t fully recovered yet.

  “Lucas, I almost forgot... I have a present for you.” She walked over to the hotel desk on the other side of the room and took out the tissue-wrapped package she had hidden behind it, carrying it back to him. “It’s just something small,” she said. “Something I wanted you to have.”

  He looked up at her in surprise as he took the package and opened it—to reveal the coverlet she’d been crocheting for weeks.

  “You need something to brighten up your room,” she explained. “It’s sort of... empty in there.”

  He held up the bright red coverlet, a wry expression curving his mouth. “Just something small?”

  “Well, all right, it’s something kind of large. And there are some crooked stitches here and there. I’m still learning.”

  “Never would’ve noticed if you didn’t point them out. Looks perfect to me.”

  He wasn’t looking at the gift as he said it; he was looking at her.

  And the warmth in his eyes made her heart beat too fast.

  “I should’ve gotten something for you,” he said apologetically.

  “That’s all right. You haven’t been in any condition to go shopping.” She didn’t need a gift. The way she felt tonight, the way he had opened up and shared so much with her, was enough. “In fact, you need to get some rest. I’ll clean up.” She moved back to the table and picked up a couple of empty dishes, heading for the kitchen.

  “Annie.”

  She turned back toward him. “Yes?”

  “Thank you.”

  From the emotion in his voice, she knew he wasn’t thanking her for the gift she had just given him, or the dinner she had made, but for listening.

  “You’re welcome, Lucas.” She watched while he retreated to his room for the night, the coverlet tucked under his arm.

  And she felt it again—that overwhelming tenderness that shimmered all through her and settled in her heart.

  Ever since she was little, she had imagined how wonderful it would be to have someone who truly cared about her.

  Never had she imagined that it might be even better to truly care about someone.

  Chapter 18

  After Lucas knocked for the third time, Holt yanked open his front door, his shirt and vest hanging unbuttoned, his eyes bloodshot. Though it was the middle of the day, the doctor looked like he’d just rolled out of bed after sleeping in his clothes—or hadn’t slept at all. “What?” he snapped.

  Lucas arched his brows in surprise and didn’t say anything for a moment, standing on the front step, the collar of his drover’s coat turned up against the snow blowing around him. “All right if I come in, Doc? Kind of cold out here, being January and all.”

  Without a word, Holt turned away into the house, leaving the door open.

  Lucas took that as an invitation and stepped inside, closing the door behind him. “Tough week?” The parlor was dark, the curtains drawn, the lanterns unlit. “You look as run-down as a two-dollar watch, Doc.”

  Only after Lucas’s eyes adjusted to the dull glow that came from the fire on the hearth did he notice an open bottle of scotch on a marble-topped table in one corner.

  Holt picked it up as he slouched onto a settee beside the fire. “Lost a patient last night,” he said tersely, taking a drink straight from the bottle. “Don’t feel much like seeing anyone today, McKenna.”

  “Sorry.” Lucas moved toward the fire. “Someone you knew a long time?”

  “Four-year-old boy.” Holt let his head rest against the back of the couch. “Delivered him the night he was born. Poor kid was always sickly, but I thought he was going to make it. I thought I could...” He shut his eyes. “Why are you here, McKenna? Is this important?”

  “Yeah.” Lucas sat in a chair opposite him. “Yeah, it’s important.” He took off his hat, turning it in his gloved fingers.

  His timing might not be the best, but Holt’s reaction to losing a patient only reinforced for Lucas that he had made the right decision. And he couldn’t keep postponing this discussion. He’d been thinking of little else for a week now.

  Putting it off wasn’t making it any easier.

  “I need to know what your plan was for helping Annie escape.”

  Holt lifted his head and opened his bloodshot eyes. “What plan? We didn’t have any—”

  “I know you were planning something,” Lucas said dryly. “I want you to tell me what it was.”

  The doctor regarded him in stony silence for a moment. “Why?”

  Lucas dropped his hat on a low table to his left and took off his gloves. Then he just said it, calmly. “Because I’m not taking her back to Missouri.”

  “What?” Holt’s eyes widened in shock.

  “I’m not taking her back to Missouri,” Lucas repeated. His fingers clenched around the soft leather of his gloves. “She’d be facing a judge and jury who’ll never believe that what happened was an accident. Men who knew her mother, men who...” He cursed under his breath. “Probably some who slept with her mother. They think of Annie as a whore, and it’ll be a short damn trip to believing she’s a thief and a murderer. Especially with half the town of St. Charles lining up to offer evidence against her. Even if I talk to the judge, even if I can get th
e headmaster from that orphanage in Denver she donated the fifteen thousand to—”

  “You’ve thought about this,” Holt said in astonishment. “A lot.”

  Lucas nodded. He’d thought it through from every angle.

  And come up with the same gut-wrenching answer every time.

  “Even if they let me testify, they’ll only claim she seduced me into lying for her,” he said roughly. “And the donation to the orphanage isn’t enough to prove her innocence. She gave it anonymously. Anyone could’ve sent them that money.” He met Holt’s steady gaze. “No jury will ever believe that my brother’s death was an accident. They’ll sentence her to life in prison. Or worse. She gets the wrong kind of judge...” The words almost choked him. “Missouri hasn’t hanged a woman in fifty years, but...” He shook his head. “I’m not going to take that chance.”

  Holt’s eyes narrowed and he set the bottle of scotch aside. “None of this seemed to bother you before, when you were in such a damned rush to haul her back to Missouri. What changed, McKenna?”

  Lucas glanced away without replying. But something must have shown in his face.

  Because the doctor fell silent for a moment, as if struck speechless.

  “You care about her,” he said at last, his voice quiet.

  Lucas swallowed hard, still uneasy with that word, unwilling to put a name to the complicated feelings he had for Annie. All he knew was that she had become important to him, in a way no other woman had ever been. “I just think she’s suffered enough.”

  “So what are you planning to do? Set her free? You’re just going to break the law?”

  “What I’m trying to do is get justice.” Lucas faced him again. “That means clearing her name. I have to go back to St. Charles and see what I can do to get the charges dismissed. And try to talk my sister-in-law into dropping the five-thousand-dollar bounty.”

  “And how likely is it you’ll be able to do that?”

  Lucas hesitated. “Not too damned likely,” he admitted reluctantly. No matter how he argued Annie’s case, he wasn’t sure he could persuade the courts to believe him.