Page 46
“You struck the piano?”
“To warn her.”
Nate came closer as Jesse’s breathing grew shallow. “That’s all for now.”
Jesse resisted long enough to say, “Wrote it?”
Eden showed him the page. “Here. All of it.”
He sank against the pillows.
Whit took his hat from the bedpost. “I’ll find out whether Rusk has a man named Sam working with him. We can follow that without troubling Jesse again today.”
“Don’t tell Bass everything,” Jesse whispered.
Whit paused.
“He’ll ride out.”
“I’ll speak with the marshal first,” Whit said. “Then I’ll decide what Bass needs to hear.”
Jesse’s hand loosened on the sheet.
Nate ushered the sheriff out and returned long enough to check his brother. Eden kept the notebook in her lap until Jesse drifted off.
She went to the front room to give Nate the new entries. Whit had already left. Nate read the page, asked her to keep the wording as Jesse had spoken it, and thanked her before she went back.
When she returned, Jesse was awake.
“Thought you’d gone.”
“Only to speak with Nate.”
“You don’t have to sit here all day.”
“I know.” Eden settled in the chair and picked up Carolina’s cuff.
He cleared his throat. “Didn’t say I wanted you to leave.”
“I know that too.”
He considered her for a moment. “What’d you do for fun back in Missouri?”
The needle paused between her fingers. “Read. Taught Sunday school. Before Josiah’s accident, I helped Father keep the accounts.”
“None of that sounds much like fun.”
“I enjoyed the books.”
“What kind?”
“Stories with happy endings.”
Jesse’s mouth twitched. “That why you came all this way? Looking for one?”
Eden could have laughed it off. Instead, she took a moment to answer.
“I came because I wanted to see what the Lord might have for me beyond Willow Bend.”
