“I hear plenty,” Blaze said.
“Not from us,” the man said quickly. “We don’t mean nothin’ by it.”
The men fell quiet, muscles straining as they hauled sack after sack. Dust swirled in the yard. Blaze bent to lift one himself, piling it against the barn wall.
“Don’t take it personal, son,” the man on the ground said after a while. “Rumors get legs, start runnin’ whether you like it or not.”
“Some say your pa was a thief,” the other muttered.
Blaze’s head snapped up.
“Easy, Jed,” the first man warned.
“What? Boy oughta know what they’re whisperin’,” Jed said.
“I know what they whisper,” Blaze said.
Jed chewed his stem of grass. “Then you know they say his blood runs in you—same as him.”
“My pa weren’t no thief,” Blaze said.
Jed raised both hands. “Didn’t say I believed it. Just sayin’ what’s out there.”
“What’s out there’s lies,” Blaze said.
The men shifted uneasily. The last sack thumped down. Silence hung a second too long.
“Anyhow,” the first man said finally, “that’s the load. Same price as usual. Your ma will square up.”
The men climbed back onto the wagon. Horses snorted, stamping in the dust.
“No harm meant, son,” the first man said.
The man tugged his hat brim. The wagon creaked forward, wheels crunching over the dry ground. Soon, only a fading trail of dust marked their leaving.
Blaze stood alone beside the sacks with his fists clenched and his jaw tight. His chest heaved with the weight of words he hadn’t spoken.
Chapter 2
Blaze startled awake, heart pounding. The dream clung to him. It was a jumble of gunfire and smoke. In the dark, he could still see his father lying in the dust with his eyes wide and blood soaking into the sand.
“Pa,” Blaze whispered, breath catching. He wiped his face, though no tears had fallen.
The room was quiet, save for the soft breathing of Rachel, curled up in the bed across from his own. Moonlight spilled in through the thin curtains, painting silver bars across the floorboards. For a long while, he lay still, willing sleep to take him again, but it wouldn’t come. His chest felt tight and restless.
He slipped from the bed, careful not to wake Rachel, and padded to the window. The ranch lay hushed in pale light, and the barn was a dark shape against the hills. The only sound was the wind whispering through the cottonwoods near the creek.
Yet something felt wrong.
Blaze frowned, leaning close to the glass.
“Just nerves,” he muttered. “Just that dream again.”
But then he heard it. It was soft at first, like the crunch of a boot on gravel. He stiffened.
Another sound followed. The distant stamp of a horse’s hoof.
His stomach dropped. He strained his ears, hardly daring to breathe. More hoofbeats came, a slow rhythm carried on the wind. Not one horse. Several.
