When Cole started screaming, it was a relief, because for a second there, he figured his brother was maybe dead.
Cole sat up, gripping the side of his face in his tiny hands. Blood was running through the fingers.
Conn picked his own shirt off the ground and pried his brother’s fingers away before pressing the shirt into the wound, which was gaping and terrible, having laid Cole wide open from one high cheekbone almost all the way to his jawline.
“Hold that shirt against it,” Conn said, and scooped his crying brother into his arms and went running through the trees and across the fields, calling for their parents.
Later, their parents remarked with something like awe that Conn carried his brother without stopping, sprinting the whole, long way, never breaking stride.
To them, this seemed a feat of supernatural strength and endurance. But it was actually sheer determination. What they didn’t understand was that Conn would have sprinted ten miles to save his brother. But of course, he was only eight, so they were still getting to know him.
His reaction to Cole’s injury was one early sign of the type of man Conn would become and the faintest suggestion of the wells of willpower and compassion that resided deep within him even then.
But again, this was casual kindness. Thoughtless, really. His brother was hurt, maybe dying, so he’d carried him home.
It was not until later that night, when they knew Cole would survive and the wounded boy was weeping out of self-pity, that Conn showed the true depth of his kindness.
Cole had latched onto the thought of the terrible scar the accident would leave. “I’m gonna look like a bad man,” he sobbed.
Conn tried to calm him down and talk sense into him. When words failed and he could no longer bear his brother’s suffering, he did what he had to do.
His parents were shocked and furious.
They didn’t understand him.
That was fine, even with the pain and punishment.
Because Cole understood.
Brothers have to stick together, no matter what happens.
That goes double for twins.
1
Fairplay, Colorado, autumn 1885
“Look at her,” Henry Toole said and nodded toward the blond-haired woman entering the hardware store with a tall man.
The man’s height and broad shoulders set Henry’s teeth on edge. Tall men were nothing special, even if they had some muscle, but folks always treated them like kings. Which is how this man had come to get such a pretty girl on his arm.
Tripp Daniels gave a low whistle. “She sure is pretty.”
The two of them sat across the street in front of the Fairplay Saloon, which should have been called the Last Stop, because they were out of money again.
Henry was sick of being out of money. He was sick of Tripp, too, but they were pards, so he put up with him. Mostly, he was sick of tall men getting all the pretty women.
He stood up and glared across the street. He and Tripp had drunk the last of their money that morning. He’d been feeling pretty good, but that was wearing off, and now what he felt was mean.
Tripp stood up. “Guess we’d better go ask Mr. Jacobs if he has any work.”
Henry spat into the street, still staring at the door the tall man and his woman had gone through. “I’m sick of Jacobs. And I’m sick of work.”
“Me, too, partner. But I ain’t sick of eating. And if we don’t get some work, we won’t have nothing to eat.”
Saying this, Tripp got a stupid grin on his face, like he thought he’d said something wise.
Henry was tempted to knock that grin off Tripp’s face, along with a few of his teeth, but then Tripp would get mad and leave and he’d probably tell the others, and then they wouldn’t want anything to do with Henry, who’d been setting things up for weeks, making them understand he was the leader of what he hoped would become a gang.
