St. Agnes Home for Women.
Quarterly payments.
Twenty dollars.
Thirty dollars.
Twenty-five dollars.
Always under initials.
M.V.W.
The most recent payment had been made only six months earlier.
Abby’s hands shook.
Caleb quietly took the paper.
“There’s more.”
He pointed to the will.
Margaret had placed her property into trust for Abby.
The conditions were specific.
Abby would receive control at age twenty-eight—
or upon legal marriage.
Suddenly everything made sense.
Abby’s twenty-eighth birthday was six months away.
Gideon had spent nearly twenty years draining the trust.
Once Abby gained control, the books would be examined.
He needed her married before that happened.
And he needed the husband to be someone he controlled.
Elias.
Had the wedding taken place, Elias could have pressured Abby into signing documents transferring the land and stock.
Then the theft would disappear beneath legitimate ownership.
But Elias Redford had seen Abby at the altar and chosen cruelty over conspiracy.
His vanity had accidentally saved her.
Caleb sat across from Abby.
Neither spoke for a long time.
Finally Abby laughed.
It sounded almost broken.
“All because he thought I was too fat to marry.”
Caleb’s eyes hardened.
“His mistake.”
She looked at him.
“Which part?”
Caleb reached across the table.
He did not touch her until she placed her hand in his.
Then he closed his fingers around it.
“All of it.”
Gideon Whittaker was arrested three days later at a railroad depot outside Topeka.
Marshal Hooper was caught two weeks after that trying to cross into Indian Territory.
The surviving records were enough.
Rustling.
Fraud.
Forgery.
Arson.
Conspiracy.
Embezzlement.
Attempted murder.
Gideon never apologized.
During his hearing, he saw Abby across the courtroom.
“You would have had nothing without me,” he said.
Abby looked at him calmly.
“That’s the lie you needed me to believe.”
For once, Gideon had no answer.
But Abby did not remain in Kansas to hear his sentence.
One week later, she boarded a train east with Caleb.
Missouri smelled different when they arrived.
Greener.
Damper.
The St. Agnes Home stood behind a brick wall outside St. Joseph.
Abby almost turned around three times before reaching the entrance.
Caleb never pushed.
He simply walked beside her.
An elderly nun led them through a long corridor.
“Mrs. Whittaker has been here many years.”
Abby’s knees weakened.
“You know who she is?”
“We know her as Margaret Vale.”
“Does she…”
Abby could barely form the question.
“Does she understand things?”
“Some days better than others.”
They reached a garden.
Several women sat beneath trees.
One had silver beginning to streak dark brown hair.
She was thinner than Abby remembered.
Older, naturally.
But the curve of her cheek—
The shape of her hands—
Abby stopped.
The woman was humming.
A song.
Abby recognized it.
Her mother used to sing it while braiding her hair.
Abby made a sound somewhere between a sob and a gasp.
