“I’ll be right here,” she said, deliberately misunderstanding him.
He closed his eyes, the laudanum obviously taking effect.His body relaxed, and Shea tried to do the same.But she was stiff and hurting and confused.
Restless and unhappy, she rose and moved through the door down the hall.An oil lamp was lit in the main room, and she quickly lit another in the kitchen.Her eyes kept going to the door of her father’s office, the room where he was shot.His office.
“No,” she told herself.“I can’t.”But still her feet moved in that direction.She picked the oil lamp off the table in the main room and slowly opened the door to the office.
Dark brown stained the rich, colorful rug, and she suddenly wanted to run from it.But she couldn’t.She had to know the truth.She didn’t know what to look for.Perhaps, she thought, she merely needed to confirm the fact that Jack Randall was everything he seemed: a rancher respected by his neighbors and friends.
But what did that make Rafe Tyler?
Shea avoided the stain on the rug and went to the desk.There was a half-smoked cigar on a plate and a ledger.Feeling like a traitor, she nonetheless looked inside.Her gaze went down the first page of many inked ones.This book started two years previously: 1871.And then she saw the notation.Sam McClary.$1,000.A year later, another one, this time for $1,500.
A drawer was partially opened, the lock broken, and it looked as though someone had started to sort through it, then stopped.Papers on top were mussed, but those underneath seemed undisturbed.She looked through them, and her hand found something heavy.She stared at it incredulously.A tintype of her mother.Sara looked beautiful, a lovely smile on her face.Shea had never seen that particular smile.A letter lay next to it.It had obviously been handled repeatedly.
Her conscience warred between her respect for Jack Randall’s privacy and the need to know why her mother had hidden his existence from her for so long.
She didn’t know how long she stood there, holding the folded page.She finally unfolded it and recognized her mother’s handwriting.She looked at the date.August 1863.Just weeks after Rafe Tyler’s court-martial.
She read the letter and then read it again more carefully.Feeling sick inside, she carefully folded it and started to place it back in the drawer.She hesitated, then took it with her to the bedroom she was using and slipped it under the mattress.
She went to the open window and looked out toward the mountains where Rafe was hiding.A half-moon hovered above the peaks, surrounded by stars.
How he must hate her father.How he must hate her.She had never truly understood before.
A cool wind blew on her, but she was oblivious to it.She was oblivious to everything except that letter and the utter hopelessness she felt.
Chapter 22
Jack Randall’s condition improved quickly, as did his charm.If Shea hadn’t read the letter, she would have been captivated by him.As it was, she found herself making excuses for him.Perhaps the letter hadn’t meant what she thought it did.
She held off her anxious questions until the fifth day.The posse still went out daily, which meant, according to Clint, they’d found nothing.Clint didn’t mention going to the mountains himself, but Shea knew he had, knew that he had told Rafe that his enemy still lived.
The doctor had returned on the third day and said it was not strange at all that Jack Randall didn’t remember anything about the shooting.It might come back, he said, and it might not.Head wounds were always unpredictable.
But he thought infection was now unlikely and told his patient he could start moving around, though his arm was to remain strapped to his chest.
Kate visited briefly.She had dropped in several times, the first to bring some supplies and several dresses.They needed a few tucks and were a little too short, but Shea had been grateful.
Kate was more reserved than the first day they’d met, and Shea wondered why.But she didn’t puzzle over it long, because other matters worried her more: how to broach the subject of Rafe Tyler with her father.
After Kate left on the fifth day, Shea made lemonade and carried a pitcher and glasses to Randall’s room.He was awake, sitting on the side of the bed.He had already walked around the room several times and now was breathing heavily, but his mouth broke into a broad grin when he saw Shea.
“You’re like a rainbow every time you come in,” he said.“You don’t know how happy you’ve made me by coming here.”
Shea set down the pitcher and poured them both a glass before she sat down in a chair next to him.“Why did you and Mama part?”It was the question that had been haunting her ever since she opened the box in Boston.
He leaned back against the headboard with a sigh.He took a long drink and then studied her carefully.“Didn’t she tell you anything?”
“She said you had died before I was born.”
Pain flickered across his face.Only after several moments of silence did he speak.
“Your mother was a city girl, gently reared,” he said.“She … never accepted the West, or what you had to do sometimes to survive.”
“I don’t understand,” Shea said.
“Moving frequently,” he said.“We didn’t have any money.Sometimes didn’t even have a place to stay.Good jobs were hard to come by.I think when she knew you were coming, she needed a safe place, and I … couldn’t provide that.Not then.”
