John had left home for good. He sure as hell wasn’t going to burden Abbie with the truth of that day.
John would never forget Isaac Leaf’s last words. Like father, like son. No kidding, he thought. Ugly inclinations still burned in his blood. Given a choice, he’d be drunk off his ass right now. He’d be at the saloon smoking cigars and playing poker. He’d be undressing Abbie with his eyes and taking her to bed.
The fever ripped through him, causing his side to ache and his head to pound. If he didn’t sit down, he’d fall over, so he pulled a chair out from the table and lowered himself into it. “This can’t be,” he managed to say.
“But it is.” Looking determined, Abbie pulled out the chair next to his and sat down. Her eyes filled with a love that shamed him. “You’re great with Robbie. Won’t you give Susanna a chance?”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
Because I’m dirt. I’ve stolen, murdered and maimed. I’ve kicked dogs and stomped on ants. God forgive me, I’ve killed children…
How could he explain that ugliness to Abbie? She may have lost her temper a time or two, but he doubted she had ever wanted to choke the air out of a man’s lungs. Nor did she have a string of enemies who wanted to see her suffer.
John gave her his hardest stare, the one he saved for his blood-and-guts sermons about Old Testament battles and the sacrifice of the cross. “I don’t want her in my life, Abbie. I have my reasons.”
The pity in her eyes said she was unimpressed. “What you want doesn’t matter. I can’t make you love Susanna, but I can make sure you don’t hurt her.”
He felt as if he’d been punched in the gut. He would never hurt a child, especially not Abbie’s daughter. But someone else hadn’t been as careful with the girl’s feelings. John pushed back in his chair. “How did she find out about me?”
A shadow fell across Abbie’s face. “Robert told her the night he died.”
“What a godawful shock.” John flattened his palm on the kitchen table. “Tell me the rest.”
“After he was elected to congress, Robert thought you’d try to blackmail him. He kept a file on you. That’s what he gave Susanna.”
John’s heart plummeted down a rabbit hole of regret. Abbie’s marriage must have been a nightmare and he’d been the cause. “Did he know about the baby when you married him?”
Abbie lowered her eyes. “Yes, but he didn’t know about you until later. It’s not important how he found out.”
John knew a lie when he heard one. It was very important, otherwise Abbie wouldn’t have mentioned it. Later he’d ask for the details, but the night was already too raw so he focused on Susanna. “Why do you think Robert told her?”
“Who knows?” Abbie said, shrugging. “He favored Robbie and she knew it. Maybe he wanted to clear his conscience, and the truth was all he had to give.”
“Guilt is an ugly thing.”
“I know.”
Her whisper matched the murmur in John’s heart. For Abbie’s sake, he wished he had been a better man when they’d first met. Where would they be today if he had charmed her into marriage instead of his bed? He could have been a lawman if they’d moved far enough west. He could have started over. He wished that he had, but what was the point? It had taken six years of hell, prison and Silas Jones to bring him to his knees.
John shifted his gaze to Abbie and saw that her eyes were shiny and tense. If she had been a member of his congregation, he would have told stories and shared a few secrets, indirectly telling her that even the worst problems could be solved. But with Abbie, talk had once led to touching, and touching had led to Susanna. Now that troubled girl was in Bitterroot, where Ben Gantry wanted to skin John alive.
If he could have climbed into a cannon and shot himself back in time to the day he’d killed Gantry’s sons, John would have done it. He still wished he’d died that day. If he had, Susanna would be safe and Abbie wouldn’t be sitting in his kitchen, making him want things he couldn’t have. He wanted to go to the stream behind the parsonage where the rushing water would calm his thoughts, but he couldn’t leave Abbie. Taking a breath, he peered into her eyes. “I have regrets, too, and I don’t want any more. I’ll help you find your daughter, but that’s it. As soon as she gets here, the three of you are getting on a train for Washington. It’s best for everyone.”
The glimmer in her eye told him he’d just started a fight he didn’t want to have. “What gives you the right to order me around? You said yourself you have an obligation. I expect you to meet it.”
“And I will. I want to pay for her schooling, her shoes, whatever she needs.”
Abbie pushed to her feet, turned her back on him and gazed out the window. The pane acted like a mirror, reflecting her sage-green eyes and determined chin as she weighed his offer. He suspected she found it sadly lacking, which it was. Needing a distraction, John took a cigarette out of his pocket and struck a match on the stove. Cupping the flame with his hand, he focused on puffing life into the tobacco. When it caught, he tipped back his head and blew a stream of smoke at the ceiling.
“Do you have to smoke that thing now?” Abbie said, fanning the air.
It was his house, and he wasn’t in the mood to appease her. Almost hoping the smoke would chase her away, John watched a puff float in her direction. As soon as it reached her nose, Abbie hurried out the back door. John thought her reaction was overdramatic, but he supposed he owed her an apology for being rude. In spite of the pull of the stitches, he pushed to his feet, doused the cigarette butt in the sink and followed her to the porch. After sitting so close to the lamp, he couldn’t see. “Abbie?”
“I’m over here.”
He followed her voice to the side of the porch that faced Broken Heart Ridge. The crest had been aptly named for two mountains separated by a slash of a gully. Sometimes the full moon rose over that spot like a silver locket, but tonight the sky was black.
As he strode toward her, his vision cleared in layers, revealing first her wrapper, then her ivory skin and finally a halo of starlight in her hair. Leaving a foot between them, he rested his forearms on the railing. Bending to ease the pain in his side, he stared with her into the night. The silhouette of pines turned the forest into a fence, trapping him in a patch of shadows and loss, a dark place that offered no easy answers.
Keeping his voice low, he said, “I’m sorry about the smoking. I guess I’m used to living alone.”
“Your bad habits are your own business,” she said. “The only issue between us is Susanna.”
John’s gaze drifted past the trees to the sky. The same stars were glimmering over Wyoming where Susanna was searching for something he didn’t have to give. “I’ll get a bank draft tomorrow. After that, I’ll send you money every month.”
Abbie shook her head. “Money isn’t enough.”
“It has to be. I’m not cut out to be a father.”
The last thing he expected to hear from Abbie was gentle laughter. Tipping her head to his,
