Fevers.
Christmas mornings.
Six years stolen.
He looked at Bell.
“Why?”
The doctor stared at the floor.
“Anna’s father.”
Tom went still.
Augustus Reed.
A wealthy cattleman from Colorado.
A man who had hated Tom from the moment Anna chose a poor rancher instead of the banker her father preferred.
Nora’s last name.
Reed.
Tom looked sharply at her.
She shook her head.
“I’m not his daughter.”
Bell explained.
“Augustus arrived while Anna was dying. He blamed you. Said if you’d had money, she’d have delivered in Denver instead of Bitter Creek.”
Tom’s face hardened.
“He offered me five thousand dollars.”
Caleb cursed softly.
Bell continued.
“He wanted the child.”
“To do what?”
“Raise her.”
Tom stood so quickly the chair fell.
“You sold my daughter?”
Bell’s voice cracked.
“Yes.”
Tom crossed the room.
The marshal intercepted him.
“Don’t.”
Tom tried to shove past.
Garrett held firm.
“He’s dying anyway.”
“I can fix that.”
“Tom!”
Nora’s voice cut through him.
Tom stopped.
Lily was staring.
Terrified.
Of him.
That destroyed his anger faster than any weapon could.
Tom backed away.
Bell continued.
“Augustus took the baby to Colorado. His household nurse was Nora Bennett.”
Tom looked at Nora.
“Bennett?”
“My real name.”
Bell nodded.
“Nora raised Lily from infancy.”
Tom stared at her.
Nora wiped her eyes.
“Augustus told me Lily’s father abandoned Anna.”
Tom laughed bitterly.
“Of course he did.”
“I believed him.”
“And then?”
“Augustus became ill last year.”
Her voice trembled.
“Near the end, he started talking in his sleep. Calling Anna’s name. Saying he had punished the wrong person.”
Nora looked at Lily.
“I found letters.”
“What letters?”
“Anna’s.”
Tom frowned.
Nora crossed to her bag.
From inside she removed a bundle tied with faded blue ribbon.
Tom recognized the handwriting before touching them.
His legs weakened.
Anna.
Nora handed him the first.
Tom unfolded it.
My dearest Father,
Tom works from before sunrise until I beg him to stop. We don’t have much, but I have never been happier. You say he stole me from you. He did not. I chose him.
Tom stopped reading.
His vision blurred.
Another letter.
Father,
If you refuse to know him, then you refuse to know me. Tom is not the cruel man you have invented in your mind. He is quiet, stubborn, impossible, and kinder than anyone I have ever known.
Another.
Father,
We are expecting a daughter.
Tom’s hand shook.
At the bottom Anna had drawn a small eight-pointed star.
The same star carved into the cradle.
Nora whispered, “Augustus kept every letter.”
Tom sank into the chair again.
“I found Dr. Bell’s name mentioned in Augustus’s private ledger. I tracked him down.”
Bell nodded.
“I told her everything.”
“Why not come to me then?” Tom asked.
Nora flinched.
It was the question she had feared.
“Because Augustus had lied to everyone for six years.”
“That doesn’t answer me.”
“I didn’t know you.”
“She was my daughter.”
“I know.”
“You let me spend three months thinking she was yours!”
Lily cried harder.
Nora’s voice broke.
“Because Augustus wrote something else.”
The marshal reached inside his coat and produced a folded document.
“His final confession.”
Tom did not take it.
Garrett continued.
“Augustus claimed one of the men involved in hiding the child eventually came to work at Hale Ranch.”
Every face in the room changed.
Caleb slowly looked toward the door.
Tom frowned.
