At the end of her work day, if she could really call it that, when she’d had no more than three customers, she half-expected the figure waiting for her outside to be Lonnie, just for routine’s sake, but instead it was Rose.
Rose looked over at her with sad eyes that made Evelyn burn all the more. She didn’t want anybody’s sympathy, least of all Rose’s.
“What is it?” she asked as Rose approached.
Rose seemed a little taken aback. “Nothing in particular,” Rose replied. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”
Evelyn sighed and started to walk away, heading in the direction of her house. Rose followed, quickly falling into step with her. “I take it you heard about what happened,” Evelyn said quietly.
“Yes,” Rose said. “But I’m not here to pry. What you do is your own business and I’m not about to—”
“What is it you want, Rose?” Evelyn snapped, stopping and turning to her in the street. “If you want information, I don’t have any for you.”
“I don’t want anything from you, Evelyn,” Rose said, firmly. “I’ve never wanted anything from you apart from your friendship, something I thought I had.”
“You do.”
“Then why are you getting mad at me?” she growled. “I’ve not done anything; all I’ve done is try to help you.”
“Well, bringing Lonnie into my life clearly hasn’t helped me at all,” Evelyn said.
“When you are with him, it’s the happiest I have ever seen you, Evelyn,” Rose said. “And you can deny it all you want, but I’ve never seen a smile on your face like the one you have when you’re with Lonnie. I’ve never heard you laugh that loud, or anything. You are more you than you ever have been around anybody else.”
Evelyn raised an eyebrow at her. “Anybody else like who?” she asked stiffly.
“That’s not what I—”
“Because it sounds like you’re thinking about Willard, Rose,” Evelyn said. “And for the last time I—"
“I don’t think for a single second that what people in town are saying is true, Evelyn,” Rose barked. “I would have thought that by now you would know that I trust you above any of them. But maybe I was wrong to do that.”
Rose started away from Evelyn.
“You know what? Maybe you were!” Evelyn spat, betrayal stinging in her heart.
Evelyn watched her go, almost irritated that she then had to walk in the same direction, so her entire route home it was like she was watching Rose walk out of her life, always a little bit out of reach, and certainly with no chance of coming back.
Evelyn stormed up the pathway to her house and took her father inside, managing to keep the tears from her eyes long enough that she could hide it all behind closed doors. She didn’t want anybody from the town to see her crying. At least if her father saw her, he wouldn’t remember the next day.
She sat him at the table and busied herself making dinner. She sliced potatoes, she sliced vegetables, she sliced meat and she put it into a pie, keeping her hands and her mind busy so she didn’t have time to think about Willard, to think about Lonnie, to think about Rose and all the ways she was messing things up in her own life.
A pair of hands found their way to her shoulders. She tensed at first until she realised it was her father.
“What’s the matter, darling?” he asked. “You seem sadder than usual.”
She wondered what her usual was to him. She hoped that he remembered her from her happier days when she was a child. She didn’t want him to know about all of the sadness that she carried through her life these days.
“Tell your Pop,” he said, rubbing her shoulders, trying to push the stress and worries away.
How much time will he have? Evelyn thought. How much time before he vanishes all over again?
“Someone who I thought was a friend of mine has let me down,” she said simply. “I thought he cared for me and that he was looking out for me, but it turned out that he wasn’t, and it’s made me sad.”
In the simplest terms, that’s what it was. She just couldn’t work out why it had happened. She thought they were closer than all that. So much had happened between them, she’d tried to push him away, but he’d been so persistent no matter what the other townspeople said, and now to do this to her seemed… strange.
Willard belonged in jail; she knew that. But she didn’t deserve to be lied to. She was far too used to not being loved or liked, but she thought that Lonnie actually did like her. And look where it had gotten her? It had just given her this horrible feeling in her chest and this anger that she just didn’t know what to do with.
“I do hope it wasn’t that male friend of yours,” her pop asked. “I’d hate for something to have happened between you two.”
Evelyn looked at him carefully. He always managed to surprise her with things like that. For the most part, he seemed like he had no idea what was going on, but every now and again he would say something, something that had happened would stick with him.
“I don’t...it was…” she trailed off. She didn’t want to color his impression of Lonnie. Even after everything that had happened, it didn’t seem fair somehow. “He... he said some things that... well…. I think he did some things that I didn’t like all that much. I don’t know how much of a friend he really was.”
Her pops looked at her carefully, a smile pulling at the corners of his mouth. She looked back at him and saw the man that she once knew, the man that had helped raise her, that had always been nothing but kind to her.
“What?” she asked.
“I don’t think that boy meant to do anything to hurt you there, Evelyn,” she said. “Now, I don’t know what he’s done, or what he’s said, but I saw the way he looked at you. I may not remember much, but I remember that look.” He sighed. “That was the look I used to give your mom. A look that tells you they’re thinking about more than just the moment at hand, they’re looking into a future that has you in it. My friends used to rip at me all the time for looking at her like that.”
Evelyn pulled her gaze away from him, not wanting to talk about it too much. She didn’t want to cry. “I don’t know Pops,” she said. “It upset me, that’s all.”
“You don’t deserve to be sad, sweetheart,” Pops said. She could hardly believe she was getting this much out of him. He never spoke like this, never really said more than a few words to her every day, but here he was just like old times. Just like it should have been between a father and a daughter. “What are you going to do?”
She wanted to burn everything to the ground. She wanted it all to be over, to not have to think about Lonnie and the way he made her feel anymore. If he’d have asked her right from the start where to find Willard, she would have done all she could to help him, if he’d have been clear about his intentions. Then she wouldn’t have gotten confused and had to deal with his betrayal. Maybe she even would have gone so far as to set Willard up, to help them trap him in some way. But now that was all for nothing.
“I don’t know, Pops,” she said. “What would you do?”
“That’s not my place to say,” he said.
Evelyn took a deep breath. Maybe it wasn’t right to burn it all to the ground. Maybe she just needed to get through it.
“I think I’m just going to have to ride it out,” she said. “Weather the storm.”
He squeezed her shoulders again. “You can weather any storm you put your mind to, sweetheart,” he said. “Dinner looks like it’s going to be delicious. Can I help?”
She smiled. “I’ve got this one, Pops,” she said. “But, if you want to make me feel better, why don’t you tell me about Mom?”
He stepped to one side so he was next to her; he looked right into her face and smiled at her sweetly.
“Mom?” he said, searching her face, like there were answers in there. As quickly as it had come, it had gone. She watched him as he rubbed his chin and looked off into the middle distance and thought about what he was going to say. “I’m s
orry, dear. How else can I help?”
Evelyn sighed. “Why don’t you head outside, Pops?” she said, trying to keep her resolve when all she wanted to do was break into pieces. “The sunset looks beautiful tonight!”
Chapter 20
“We’ve got him,” Tommy said to Lonnie as he walked through the door the next morning. “We’ve got a trail on Willard, he is at Blue Cove Point, do you know where that is?”
Lonnie didn’t have a chance to respond; Sheriff Hawker had already pulled a map from his desk drawer and was showing him how to get there. It was only a little way out of Malwakee, the town he’d been to the other day to round up those bandits.
“What’s happening?”
“Someone from Malwakee swore that they saw Willard there in their saloon and heard of him heading to Blue Cove Point, today,” Tommy jabbed at the map. “He is going to be here today. This could be our chance.”
“Do we know if he had anybody with him?”
“Not that I heard.” Tommy seemed agitated. This was way more than just another criminal to him; this was the guy who stopped him from working. It wasn’t really a wonder that Tommy was getting so worked up about it. “But if you go now, maybe you can catch him.”
“Okay, I’ll head out there now,” Lonnie replied.
“Do you need reinforcements?”
Lonnie considered it for a moment. “Not this time,” he said. “If he sees a lot of us coming, it’s just going to give him another chance to run. Let me try and do this on my own.”
Tommy didn’t look so sure. Lonnie could see that he wanted to contradict him, wanted to send him there with every single man in town if he could swing it, but Lonnie didn’t think that would be the right thing to do. Willard would be expecting an armed infantry, that may even have been what he was after. If Lonnie could go at it alone, he would have the element of surprise.
“Trust me on this,” Lonnie said. “At least let me try.”
Tommy sighed. “Fine,” he said. “But be careful.”
Lonnie didn’t waste any more time; he headed out of the sheriff’s office and untied his horse. He rode as quickly as he could, pushing perhaps a little harder than he should’ve, desperate to get there before Willard vanished into thin air. This could be it.
He ran through a thousand scenarios in his head, what he would say to Willard when he caught him red-handed about to steal something, or when he saved an innocent family from him doing something terrible. He would be the hero. He wasn’t doing it for the glory, but if he could get this done, then maybe everything could go back to how it was. Maybe Evelyn would care for him again.
He shook his head. Now is not the time to be thinking about her, he thought. Keep your mind on the job, Lonnie.
He continued to ride until he reached a small sign that had ‘Blue Cove Point’ written on it in black letters. The town wasn’t huge, a little smaller than Kecheetah perhaps. There was a general store, a hardware store, some market traders selling their wares in a town square. In the distance, he could see ranches, little buildings with acres and acres of land fenced off around them, animals grazing inside.
Lonnie kept his eyes peeled, watching for Willard. He tied his horse outside the saloon, leaving it near the trough so he could get some water and then he walked further into town. The townsfolk were eyeing him carefully, every single one of them trying to read him as best they could. Lonnie did the only thing he could really think to do in that moment and smiled at them. It was how he had won over the people of Kecheetah, why would it be any different here? But they seemed more wary of him.
Maybe this isn’t the first time strangers have come into their town and caused problems, he thought. Maybe Willard has been here before.
“Excuse me, miss,” he said to a young blonde woman walking by. She quickened her pace and headed in the direction of the general store, hiding herself behind the doors. They slammed shut and a few more eyes trained on him. “Never mind,” he muttered.
He turned and saw a man approaching him. He was huge. Taller than Lonnie, his eyes bright green and drilling into him, even at a distance. He stared at Lonnie.
“You got a problem, buddy?”
“Not at all, sir, actually I—”
“Well, I’d be more than happy to give you a problem,” the man grunted. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m from Kecheetah,” Lonnie replied.
The man bristled. “Kecheetah?”
“I’m pretty sure I know why you recognize that name,” Lonnie said. “But it’s not what you think. I am from the sheriff’s office. I’m here to help.”
“Help with what?”
Lonnie leaned in. “I’ve been tipped off that somebody that shouldn’t be here, is here to cause trouble,” he said. “I’m sure you’re aware of a bandit who goes by the name of Willard Lane.”
The man let out a low growl. “Yeah, I’ve heard of him.”
“Well, I’ve heard that he is here, or at least coming here, and I wanted to take a look around,” Lonnie said. “I’m trying not to draw too much attention to myself.”
“You’re doing a terrible job, then,” the man said, offering Lonnie a smile. “I’ll keep my ear to the ground. I’ll find you if I hear anything.”
“Thank you.”
Lonnie continued through the town, walking past the stores, past the market traders, looking about himself for the dark-haired man who had been such a menace to so many people. He started out of town, toward the ranches. The sun was reaching the peak of its curve, the heat of it beating down on Lonnie. He could feel the sweat running down his back. He needed to stop, he needed to drink something, but he’d moved too far out of town.
Then he heard something to his left. It sounded like feet pounding the ground a little too hard, running. He followed it, trying to figure out just where it was coming from, not wanting it to get out of earshot. He made it to a ranch, a house painted bright red and white in front of a large patch of land covered with cattle. That’s where the commotion was coming from?
Great, Lonnie thought. I’ve run all this way to watch cattle being reared.
He sighed and was about to turn back toward town, when he heard a yell, a growl and a gunshot. He turned on his heel and headed back toward the field of cattle.
Standing among the cattle was a man with dark hair, a dark moustache, and eyes as black as sin. He was fanning himself with his hat, the heat of the day apparently getting to him too, as he looked around himself at the cattle about him.
Willard, Lonnie thought.
Lonnie climbed the fence as quietly as he could, moving into the field slowly, not wanting to draw attention to himself. But he couldn’t get much closer. The cattle were surrounding Willard on all sides.
He pointed his gun. He had a clear shot.
If he took it, all of this would be over. His hand shook.
Do it, he thought. Just finish him.
But he couldn’t do it. He wanted to finish it but, more than that, he wanted to bring him in. He wanted to see him locked in a cell, he wanted to see him punished for what he’d done. And he was sure that was what Sheriff Hawker wanted too.
Lonnie raised his arm and fired his gun into the air. Willard jumped and turned around. He locked eyes with Lonnie, the two of them staring at each other. Willard smiled. It was a snakelike smile that sent a chill through Lonnie’s bones, even in this heat.
“If it isn’t our lovesick puppy,” Willard growled. “I wondered when I would be meeting you, Ranger Steele.”
“Don’t make a fuss, Willard,” Lonnie said, training his gun back on Willard. “I want to take you back to Kecheetah. I don’t want to hurt you, but I will.” But even Lonnie could see that he was shaking. He just had to hope Willard couldn’t see it.
“You say that, boy,” Willard growled. “But you’re not the only one with a gun.”
Willard withdrew his gun and pointed it right back at Lonnie, the two of them standing in a field with a herd of cattle between them. Lo
nnie would have to shoot first, because if he didn’t shoot first, he wouldn’t be back in Kecheetah himself, let alone returning a hero with Willard in tow.
He started to press his finger down on the trigger, when Willard suddenly dove to one side and fired a shot. Lonnie dropped to the ground, but not quite quickly enough. The bullet hit his shoulder, ripping through his shirt and drilling deep beneath his skin. He couldn’t help but cry out, his hand flying to it and immediately applying pressure. When he pulled his hand away, he could see the red, the blood dripping down and soaking his shirt. He heard footsteps moving quickly, running back in the direction of town.
With a heaving breath, Lonnie dragged himself to his feet in time to see Willard on the run. His shoulder hurt, the blood already soaking through his shirt, but he couldn’t just let the guy go. This could be his only chance to catch him.
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