The Inheritance (30 page)

No way could he win this fight, yet he couldn’t tuck tail and run either. She needed to know the thin line Robert was walking, and how she was contributing to that, even with the best of intentions. “With all due respect, ma’am, Robert may be young, but he’s hardly a boy anymore.”

“He’s only fourteen!” Her voice rose.

“He’s old enough to know when to keep his mouth shut. And he’s big enough for someone else to shut it for him, if he won’t.”

She stepped closer. “I
love
my brother, Marshal Caradon, very much. And because I love him, I could never stand by—without feeling, without conscience—and watch him be battered like that! And God help me . . .” Her lips trembled. “I don’t understand how you could.”

He winced at the callousness she attributed to him. He wanted to touch her, to somehow soften what he was about to say, but she looked of the mind to slap him if he tried, so he curbed that desire. “I think, ma’am, the reason you don’t understand is because we have different definitions of what it means to love.”

Her mouth fell open. If someone walked in on them now, they would assume he’d just struck her, and they would be half right. Seeing her pain, Wyatt wished he could take back the words, however much he thought they were true.

“Well . . .” She stared. “If your definition of love is to cast someone aside and give up all hope on them, then I wish to have nothing to do with it. And I don’t want you near Robert either. He needs someone who’s going to be for him, not against him.”

“He needs someone, ma’am, who’s going to let him stand or fall on his own merit. It’ll be good for him.” He hesitated, then realizing he’d gone this far, plunged in with both feet. “And about you going to talk to Trenton about his job this morning . . .” He shook his head. “You can’t be coming to the boy’s rescue every time he gets into trouble.”

“Coming to his rescue? That’s what you think I’m doing?” Her face flushed crimson. “If that’s what you’re thinking, then apparently you’ve never loved someone. You’ve never cared for someone so deeply that you would give your very life if you could—” She swiped at the tears on her cheeks as if angry they’d fallen. “If you could just keep them from going through any more pain. If you could give them what they should’ve been given from the very start. I was nine years old when Robert was born. I gained a baby brother and lost a mother in the very same day. My father left everything about raising Robert to me. Do you have any idea how frightening that was? He not only didn’t hold Robert, after she died . . .” She took a halting breath. “He never held me again either. Never touched me. I used to stand close and pass him tools in the livery, just so our fingers would brush. I just wanted to touch him.”

She licked her lips, and Wyatt could almost taste the salt of her tears on his own tongue. His throat ached with emotion. He stepped closer, but she retreated.

“Miss Ashford, believe me when I say that I’m sorry for all you and your brother have been through. It wasn’t my intention to add to your hurt in any way. I’m only trying to—”

She held up a hand, not looking at him. “I think you should leave, Marshal Caradon.” She nodded again, more confidently. “I
want
you to leave.”

He fought the insane urge to wipe away her tears. Either that or shake her until she could see that his actions toward Robert
were
rooted in love. Just love of a different kind. “I’ll go, Miss Ashford. But as far as never having cared for somebody so deeply, I do know what it’s like to—”

“Mr. Wyatt!”

He turned and looked through the open barn doors. Emma was headed straight for him, her tiny legs pumping hard. Needing one of her hugs about now, he met her halfway and knelt and caught her in his arms. “Hey, little one! How are you?” Standing, he scooped her up with him and held her close, catching a whiff of maple syrup.

She pulled back and took his face in her hands, her fingers sticky. “You came to see me!”

He smiled and chucked her beneath her tiny chin. “I sure did.”

“Marshal Caradon was just leaving, Emma.” McKenna’s voice was strained. “He has a very important job to do. Please say good-bye to him now, so he can be on his way.”

Wyatt peered up. Anger and finality darkened McKenna’s eyes.

Emma’s smile fell. “But you just got here! I don’t want you to go.”

“I’m sorry, little one.” Wyatt brushed the pinkish hue of her cheek, realizing how badly he didn’t want to leave. But this wasn’t his family. This wasn’t his homestead. And no matter his feelings, he had no claim to anything—he looked up at McKenna—or anyone, here.

He kissed the top of Emma’s head, and she grabbed hold around his neck and wouldn’t let go.

“I wanna go to dinner with you,” she said, crying. “Clara does too.”

“Well . . . maybe—” He found it impossible to swallow. “Sometime when I’m back through here, you and me and Clara can go.”

She cried harder and held on tighter.

He pried Emma’s arms from his neck and handed her to McKenna, who took her—still crying and reaching out for him—back into the house. McKenna closed the door behind them, but Emma’s wails breached the walls of the cabin.

He walked back into the barn and saddled up Whiskey, then started down the road without a backward glance. At the far end, just before the curve, he paused, and took one final look. Then raised a hand in farewell, hoping McKenna was watching. But knowing she wasn’t.

Wyatt got to Bixby a half hour late, distracted and at odds with himself. Samuel Ramsey, his boss, was already waiting at the restaurant. They ordered breakfast and launched into a discussion of the Brinks’ robberies. Ramsey relayed what new details they had while soliciting Wyatt’s ideas on how to proceed.

Wyatt kept having to pull his thoughts back to the conversation at hand, his mind repeatedly wandering to the one he’d just left.

“Marshal Caradon?” Ramsey asked at one point.

Wyatt blinked. “Yes, sir.” Had Ramsey asked him another question? He sighed. “I’m sorry, sir. Would you repeat that, please?”

“Listen, Caradon, this is a sensitive case. Brinks is a powerful man and has close connections with President Hayes. We can’t afford for this investigation to be compromised in any way. If you don’t think you can handle it, then—”

“I can do it, sir. I give you my word. My mind wandered there for a minute. It won’t happen again.”

Wyatt listened, committing to memory every detail Ramsey told him. The burden to find the men responsible for these crimes deepened, as did his awareness of how much the Marshals Office was depending on him. Thirteen people had been killed in the stagecoach robberies so far—two of his fellow marshals, nine men who’d been driving or riding shotgun on the stages, and two female passersby who’d been caught in the crossfire.

Everything Ramsey said to him confirmed that he’d been right not to tell McKenna about this assignment.

Ramsey took another sip of coffee. “We got a lead from the sheriff over in Timber Ridge this week that really helped us out.”

“James McPherson?” Wyatt asked.

Ramsey nodded. “You know him?”

“Sure do. He’s a good man. Met him when I was back through a year or so ago. He’d make a good marshal.”

“I already tried. He said no.” Ramsey stood and slipped some bills from his pocket. “He actually reminds me a lot of you.” He laid the money atop the receipt their waitress had left. “You’re one of our best, Caradon. We chose you for this case because you follow orders. Because you’re thorough, levelheaded, and you’ve never come back without your man.”

Wyatt nodded once. “Thank you, sir.”

“This case could take weeks or months. We’ll meet again in a few days, see what you’ve found.”

Wyatt rose and shook his hand. “I appreciate your confidence, sir. And that of the Marshals Office.”

“When you identify the men behind all this, Caradon, we’ll send others to bring them in. We’d rather keep your affiliation with the Marshal’s Office as quiet as we can.” Ramsey smiled. “We prize your subversive persistence—working in our favor, of course.”

Wyatt sat there long after Ramsey left, but his mind was no longer on the assignment facing him. It was on a woman—a stubborn, independent, headstrong, opinionated, beautiful, loving, caring, capable, well-meaning woman. A woman worth fighting for.

Even if it meant fighting against her first.

TWENTY-SEVEN

W
hat if I offer to fill in for Robert? Just until he’s well again?” McKenna read skepticism in Casey Trenton’s expression and knew he wasn’t favorable to the idea. Nor had she expected him to be. This wasn’t the best time to talk to him either. Noon hour at the livery was busy. Customers kept coming in and out, and Trenton was flooded with work. But she needed to get this settled.

Mr. Billings’s letter was foremost in her mind and told her that the bank was readying the foreclosure. Her ability to keep the ranch depended on the income Robert made from working at the livery, and he needed to have something constructive to do with his time once he got well enough to work again. Instead of gambling his time and money away in saloons. Dr. Foster had agreed to stay with him until she returned. She owed that dear man a fortune in physician fees, and yet he’d charged her nothing. “I’ll come in at night, Mr. Trenton, after hours. No one will even see me, I promise.”

“Aunt Kenny?”

She rubbed Emma’s back. “Just a minute, sweetheart.”

“But Aunt Kenny, I really need to—”

“Just a moment, Emma,” she said, using a more authoritative tone.

Emma quietly nodded and looked down.

Using a pair of long-handled tongs, Trenton retrieved a horseshoe from the white-hot coals of the forge and positioned the shoe on the anvil. McKenna took a step back, shielding Emma behind her. He brought the mallet down—once, twice—and sparks flew. With every couple of blows, he stopped and studied the horseshoe, then begin pounding again. Finally, apparently satisfied with the results, he plunged the horseshoe into a bucket of water. Steam rose with a hiss.

He tugged a handkerchief from his back pocket and wiped the sweat from his brow. “So you’re telling me you can build wagons now too, ma’am? At night? All by yourself?”

“Well . . .” McKenna forced a soft laugh. “No, of course not. But I can
follow someone’s measurements and I can cut and size boards to fit, so when Robert returns—in only a week, two at the most, Dr. Foster said—he’ll have everything ready to build a new wagon.” Mr. Trenton started shaking his head and she rushed to continue. “I can shoe a horse. I can clean and organize your tools. I can service the forge.” She pointed to the stone furnace to accentuate her point. “And we both know it needs cleaning.”

Flames from the forge bolstered the noonday heat, and McKenna felt herself start to perspire. “Mr. Trenton, I can muck out stables, sir. And I’ll—”

He turned to her, his bushy brows nearly meeting in the middle. “And just when do you think you’re gonna do all this, ma’am? Before or after”—he glanced around the shop—“you make good on all those saddles we’ve got orders for?” His gaze dropped to Emma. “Not to mention take care of your little one there.”

Little one . . .

Emotion burned McKenna’s eyes. That’s what Caradon called Emma. She firmed her jaw until the temptation to cry had passed. She’d done enough of that on the way here this morning.