by Nerys Leigh
“Why didn’t you tell me when Briggs first found you? I need to know when someone threatens Sara and the twins.”
“I wouldn’t let anything happen to them. I’d protect them with my life.”
“I know that, but you still need to tell me.”
Will nodded. His brother was right. About telling him, not about Will being stupid. Although he was probably right about that too.
“So why didn’t you tell me?” Dan asked.
“I didn’t want you to look at me the way you did in the barn just now. I didn’t want you to know I’d messed everything up.” He looked at his hands in his lap. “I didn’t want you to be disappointed in me again.”
Before he knew what was happening, Daniel pulled him into a hard hug. “You’re my brother,” he whispered. “I’ve never been disappointed in you. Sad for you, yes, but never disappointed.”
A breath shuddered through Will’s body. Squeezing his eyes shut, he rested his forehead against his brother’s shoulder. “I’m sorry.”
“I know.”
The relief that flooded through him made Will light-headed. Or maybe it was having been awake all night. Either way, he felt lighter, the burden he’d been carrying no longer the crushing weight it had been.
Good, he felt God say.
A smile crept onto Will’s face. “I think the twins are doing something to you.” A week ago, he wasn’t sure his brother would have hugged him.
Chuckling, Dan sat back. “I think you might be right. I didn’t tell you this before, but when I held them for the first time, I cried. And not just a few manly tears. I was really blubbering for a while there.”
Will burst into laughter. “And in front of all the women.”
“Funny thing about women; they seem to like it when men cry. Like it makes us vulnerable. They like it when we’re strong, but they also like it when we’re weak.”
“I don’t understand women at all.”
“I don’t think we’re meant to understand them. We just have to appreciate that we have them.”
Will thought of Daisy. “Yeah.”
“So is this why you stopped your courtship with Daisy?”
There were times when Dan came disturbingly close to reading Will’s mind.
“This whole thing with Briggs made me realize that I won’t ever be free of my past. If it isn’t him, it’ll be something else. If I marry her, I’ll always be putting her and Nicky at risk. I can’t do that.”
“Ignoring the fact that you’re probably wrong about that, shouldn’t she be the one to decide?”
He’d thought of that. “I don’t want to give her the choice, because she might choose me. And she shouldn’t.”
Dan studied him for a few seconds. “You’re in love with her, aren’t you?”
Will drew in a deep breath, let it out slowly, and nodded. “Yeah. And stop smiling at me like that.”
“Am I smiling?” Dan asked, clearly making no effort to stop smiling.
Will heaved a sigh, shaking his head.
“I seem to recall you saying on many occasions that you would never fall in love,” Dan said, still smiling. “I also seem to recall telling you that you would.”
“You’re so insufferable when you’re right, you know that?”
If anything, Dan’s smile got even wider. “I’m happy for you. Daisy is exactly what you need. We just have to fix this thing with Briggs and it’ll all work out.”
Will’s shoulders slumped. For a while there, he’d been feeling better. “How are we going to do that?”
Dan pursed his lips, thinking. “Are you sure he’ll follow through on his threats?”
Will had little doubt of that. “Remember the morning after the barn burned down, when I came home after being in a fight?”
“I remember your face still being black and blue when I got my sight back.” He frowned. “Briggs did that?”
“That was the night I won that money from him. He accused me of cheating. I didn’t know he’d gambled with his mortgage payment. After I left the saloon, he ambushed me, demanded I give him the money back. But I’d spent it all by then. He’d sobered up since the game, I’d got drunk, and…” He shrugged. “He ran off when Sol turned up, and I thought that was that. I went to Daisy and she patched me up, and I slept off the alcohol on her settee.”
“Why didn’t you come home?”
“I didn’t want Sara to see me like that, and I didn’t want to worry you. You had enough to worry about as it was.”
“You know you still looked rough the next day, right?”
Will smiled. “I was drunk. My logic wasn’t working too well.” His smile faded. “If I’d had any idea about the barn…”
“Stop it.” Dan cut off another apology. “Don’t bring that all up again. You couldn’t have known. It wasn’t your fault.”
Will nodded, although the guilt still nipped at him.
“We need to tell Marshal Cade about Briggs,” Dan said. “Maybe he can help.”
“I already tried that, after Briggs cornered me in the alley. The marshal said he’d tell him to leave town but that he couldn’t lock him up since he hasn’t done anything illegal. And Briggs came back anyway.”
Dan lowered his gaze to the floor, releasing a long breath. “I don’t know what else to do.”
“I could do what Briggs wants.” Will glanced at the window as if he could see the Royal Flush from there. “I could play in that high stakes game and win him the money.”
Dan’s face hardened. “No, absolutely not. You’re not going back into the saloon.”
“What if I have no choice?” Will shoved his fingers through his hair. “We can’t live with the threat that he’ll do something if I don’t.”
Dan shook his head, but as he looked towards the house, Will knew he was thinking the same thing he was – that he would do anything to protect Sara and the twins.
“If you go back in there,” Dan finally said, “will you be able to come out again?”
Will wanted to say yes, but the truth was, he wasn’t sure. No one knew better than him that the temptation to go back to his old ways might be too much. “I don’t know, but what else can I do? For Sara and the twins, and Daisy and Nicky?”
“I wish I knew.” He looked back to Will. “But don’t you ever keep anything like this from me again, you hear me?”
Will nodded, and despite everything, smiled. “Thanks.” That single word didn’t come close to expressing everything he felt, but he didn’t think there was one that could.
“That’s what big brothers are for.” Dan pushed to his feet. “Come on, let’s go get some breakfast. I think there are some of Mrs. Goodwin’s cinnamon muffins left.”
Will leapt to his feet. If anything was guaranteed to make a person feel better about life, it was Mrs. Goodwin’s cinnamon muffins.
Chapter 19
“Ma?”
“Yes?” Even though her mother wasn’t home, Daisy kept her reply to Nicky in the next room down to something below a shout. Sally Moran didn’t think women should yell, something she’d repeatedly tried to instill in Daisy since she was small. It hadn’t stuck.
“Is Grandma going to bring candy?”
When they left home the previous morning, they hadn’t taken the candy Nicky had left over from his birthday. He’d been lamenting it ever since.
“She promised she’d get some from the store for you,” she called back with a smile.
“What if she forgets?”
“I’m sure she won’t.”
Her parents lived very close to town, so Daisy could have gone home to get the candy. But something in the way Will begged her to take Nicky and leave had scared her. Until she knew it was safe, she wouldn’t take her son home. She hadn’t even gone to her mother’s quilting circle in town when she invited her, although that was also because their weekly meetings were only half to do with quilting. The gathered women gossiped as they sewed, something Daisy wasn’t interested in.
&
nbsp; The back door opened as she finished cleaning the last of the lunch dishes, and her father walked in.
“I’m going over to Abe Pearson’s to help him fix the front axle of his wagon,” he said. “Will you be all right here while I’m gone?”
She hadn’t told her parents why she and Nicky were there. They didn’t say anything, but she knew they thought she was having another period of melancholy, like she’d had after Nicky was born and then again after Gareth’s death. She’d stayed with them for a while then, too, when it became too much. She let them think that. There was no sense in worrying them when she didn’t even know if there was a reason to be worried.
“I’ll be fine,” she told her father. “I have two dresses and a jacket to finish before next weekend. I’ll be sewing all day anyway.”
His brow wrinkled. “You know you can talk to me or your ma whenever you need to, don’t you?”
She smiled. “I know, Pa. You don’t need to worry about me.”
“I have to worry about you. It’s my job. You want me to take Nicky?”
She considered it and then shook her head. She wanted to keep her son close. “No, I’d like him here with me. But thanks.”
When whatever was going on had passed, she was going to have strong words with Will for making her this nervous.
“Well, don’t work too hard,” he said with a smile. “I’ll be back later this afternoon.”
He leaned forward to kiss the top of her head, just like he used to when she was a child. Just like Will did with Nicky. And then he left.
Daisy wandered back into the living room where her son was playing with the train Will had given him for his birthday, creating a landscape of books and other items he was procuring from around the house for it to run through. Her sewing was arrayed over the table and she sat and picked up the dress she was making for Mrs. Vernon.
Fifteen minutes later, Nicky stood from the book mountain he was creating. “I need some water.”
“What for?”
He looked at her as if it should be obvious. “A lake.”
A vision of water flooding all over her mother’s new rug came to her. “How about your blue shirt? If you scrunch it up, it will look like water.”
He pressed his lips together and to one side, the way Gareth used to when he was thinking. Daisy wasn’t sure how he’d picked up the mannerism since she was fairly sure Nicky barely remembered his father anymore, but she loved seeing it.
“I’ll try it,” he said, and headed for the bedroom.
Smiling, she returned her attention to her work.
“Ma!”
Her heart hit her throat at Nicky’s frightened cry. Casting her sewing aside, she leapt up and ran for the door. “Nicky?”
There was no answer.
She rushed to the bedroom, but he wasn’t there.
“Nicky!” she screamed, racing for the kitchen.
She burst through the door and stumbled to a halt, her gut clenching.
Across the room, Nicky stood facing her. Behind him was a man she didn’t know, one hand over Nicky’s mouth. The other held a gun to his head.
Nicky’s terrified eyes stared at her.
Daisy fought the urge to rush the man and tear his eyes out. “Who are you? What do you want?”
“I don’t want to hurt neither of you, Mrs. Monroe, so you just stay calm.”
She ground her teeth together. “You have a gun pointed at my son. I am very far from calm. If you hurt him, I will make you regret it.” She’d never made a threat she meant so much before, but she’d never been so angry and scared before.
“If you do as I say, he won’t get hurt.” He moved his hand from over Nicky’s mouth.
“Ma!” Nicky choked, trying to run to her.
The man clamped his hand around his chest and pulled him back.
Daisy took a step towards them, fists clenching.
“You stay right there,” the man ordered, swinging the gun towards her.
She stopped, a tear sliding down Nicky’s cheek wrenching at her chest. “What do you want?”
He nodded at the kitchen table, and for the first time she noticed two lengths of thin rope that hadn’t been there before. “I want what’s owed me. Sit down at the table and put your hands together behind you.”
If she was bound, she’d have no chance to save her son. “What do you mean, what’s owed you? I don’t even know who you are. How can I owe you anything?”
“Not you, you’re just insurance, to make sure Raine does as he says.”
Will. This was why he’d told them to go to her parents.
“I don’t know what’s going on, but it’s nothing to do with us. If you leave now…”
“Sit down!” he snapped, jabbing the gun at the table.
Clenching her teeth, she walked slowly towards the table, which also took her closer to the man.
This would be her only chance.
“Sit,” he ordered, waving his gun at the chair.
She took a step in that direction, then spun and lunged at him.
He released Nicky, using both hands to fend her off as she grabbed for his gun.
“Nicky, run!” she screamed, struggling to keep the man’s arm pointed away from her son.
Nicky hesitated, his wide eyes on her.
“Go!”
The man threw a wild punch at her body. She twisted out of the way, but he still caught her side, and she hissed in pain.
Nicky whirled and raced from the room.
With her son out of the line of fire, she let go of the man’s arm and charged at him with all her strength, ramming her shoulder into his gut. Caught off balance, he fell backwards, hitting the floor with a grunt.
Daisy grabbed at the sink, only just managing to keep from falling on top of him. She’d hoped he would lose his gun, but it was still clutched in his hand.
Before he could recover, she raced for the hallway.
Her first instinct was to find Nicky, but at a noise behind her she glanced back to see the man appear at the kitchen door. He launched himself towards her and she turned and sprinted for her bedroom, praying her son wouldn’t be there.
To her relief, there was no sign of Nicky when she burst through the door, the man only feet behind her. She dashed across the room to the nightstand where she’d left her revolver.
The man barreled into her, throwing them both to the floor just shy of her goal.
She kicked back and there was a grunt as her right foot connected with his shoulder. Despite his pain, he grasped her ankle as she tried to scramble to her feet.
Flipping onto her back, she aimed a kick at his face with her free foot, but he jerked his head out of the way and pinned both her legs beneath him.
Unable to free herself, she reached back desperately for the nightstand, stretching as far as she could, but it was just out of her reach.
“Stop fighting,” the man growled, shoving the barrel of the gun into her face.
“Ma?”
No. She looked back to see Nicky standing in the open doorway. “Nicky, run!”
The man didn’t take his eyes from Daisy. “You stay here, boy.”
“Don’t listen to him!” she cried out desperately. “Run away and hide.”
“If you run, I’ll hurt your ma.”
Tears streaming down his face, Nicky raced across the room and threw himself into her arms. “Don’t hurt her!”
Daisy held him tight, gasping for breath as he pressed his face to her shoulder.
She raised her eyes to glare at the man. With Nicky there she couldn’t say the words, but she wanted the man in no doubt that if he did anything to harm her child, she would rip him to pieces.
Chapter 20
“Are you sure you don’t want me in there with you?”
Will glanced at Daniel riding River beside him. It wasn’t anywhere near the first time he’d asked. “Rufus won’t let you into the game.”
“I could insist. Strongly.”
&n
bsp; “I appreciate the offer, but you’ll just be a distraction. I need all my concentration.”
Dan was quiet for half a minute before speaking again. “I don’t like it.”
“I know. Neither do I, but I have no choice.”
Dan pressed his lips together and didn’t say anything more until they were at the Royal Flush Saloon.
Briggs stood outside the door, waiting for them. He walked down the steps in front of the saloon as they rode up. “Wasn’t sure you’d come.”
Will climbed from Ginger’s back and secured her to the hitching post. “You didn’t give me much of a choice.”
Dan put River next to Ginger and walked up to them.
Briggs frowned. “Who’re you?”
Daniel loomed over him. Both he and Will had several inches on Briggs. “I’m his brother. You threatened my wife and children.”
Briggs’ face paled and his hand darted to the gun holstered at his waist. “If you try anything…”
“I’m not here to harm you,” Dan replied, “although I am very sorely tempted, make no mistake about that. I’m here to make sure nothing happens to Will.”
Briggs looked between the two of them. “You just stay away from me. If you don’t, you’ll regret it.”
Keeping one hand on his gun, he pushed the other into his jacket pocket and pulled out a woman’s handkerchief.
Will recognized it straight away.
He snatched the handkerchief from Briggs’ hand, unfolding it to reveal the ‘D.M.’ skillfully embroidered in the corner.
Balling the material in his fist, he grasped Briggs’ collar. “Where did you get this?”
Briggs shook him off, stepping out of reach. “You know where I got it. I reckoned you’d need a bit of motivation. If you don’t win me that money, things won’t go well for the widow and her son.”
A hole ripped open Will’s gut. He grabbed Briggs’ collar again, this time with both hands, and jerked him forward. “Where are they? What have you done to them?”
Briggs attempted to step back, but this time Will wasn’t letting go. “I haven’t done anything to them, yet. But if you do anything to me, you’ll never find them.”
It was all Will could do to not drive his fist into Briggs’ face. “Where are they?”