Norah stared at the closed door.
Six weeks earlier she would have cried.
She had cried enough since then.
Now she simply looked tired.
Thomas said, “Come to my ranch.”
Norah looked at him.
“No.”
“Hope needs you.”
“Then I’ll come feed her.”
“Fourteen miles twice a day?”
Norah said nothing.
“You can have your own room. Your own key. Nobody bothers you.”
“People will talk.”
Thomas almost laughed.
“People already talk.”
That was true.
Norah looked down at Hope.
The baby had fallen asleep against her chest.
For the first time in weeks, Norah felt something inside her that wasn’t grief.
Purpose.
She stood carefully.
“I’ll pack.”
Thomas smiled faintly.
Then something slipped from Hope’s blanket.
A folded paper.
It landed on the floor.
There was dried blood across one corner.
Thomas’s smile vanished.
He bent and picked it up.
“I’ve never seen this.”
The paper was folded twice and sewn into the blanket’s inner lining.
A seam had apparently broken.
Thomas opened it.
Norah watched his face lose color.
“What?”
He didn’t answer.
“Thomas?”
He handed her the letter.
The handwriting was delicate.
Uneven.
The top read:
Thomas, if I am dead when you find this, do not trust Reverend Bell.
Norah’s pulse quickened.
Thomas read over her shoulder.
He knows the truth about Hope. He knows what is buried beneath the north pasture, and he knows why your father really died. If he comes for our daughter, take her to the old mission and find the woman with the silver cross.
The final line was smeared with blood.
But still readable.
And Thomas—Hope is not who you think she is. Forgive me. — Abigail
Thomas stared at the words.
“Not who I think she is?”
Then hoofbeats sounded below.
Many horses.
A man’s voice thundered from the street.
“Thomas Hayes!”
Thomas crossed to the window.
His face changed.
“Bell.”
Norah joined him.
Reverend Josiah Bell stood outside beside Sheriff Cooper.
Behind them were six armed men.
The preacher wore black.
His silver hair shone beneath his hat.
He looked less like a minister than a judge arriving to deliver sentence.
The sheriff raised a document.
“Thomas Hayes! By order of the county court, surrender the child immediately!”
Norah instinctively tightened her arms around Hope.
Thomas looked at her.
“Can you ride?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
He pulled his revolver.
“Because we’re leaving.”
They escaped through the rear stable.
Martha delayed the sheriff by overturning an entire shelf of preserves across the boardinghouse hallway and loudly blaming her arthritis.
Norah rode Thomas’s mare.
Thomas rode behind on his black stallion.
Hope was wrapped tightly against Norah’s chest.
They headed west instead of toward the Hayes ranch.
“Where are we going?” Norah shouted.
“The old mission.”
“The letter could be a trap.”
