today, but soon.”
He said nothing. Arguing with her was useless. She was too damn stubborn.
“I’m not leaving you.” She placed a gnarled hand against her heart, then covered his own with it. A pulse of energy passed between them. “Soon you will be my heart. I will be with you always in your heartbeat, in your son’s heartbeat, in your daughter’s heartbeat.”
She was wrong. For him there would be no son, no daughter. Once he’d shared dreams of a family with Ellen. They’d mapped out a whole future filled with horses and children…and love. But those dreams had died on the river sixteen years ago. The void stirred an eddy of sorrow in his heart.
Nina dug into the worn leather pouch she carried at her waist and brought out what looked like a piece of bone. “This is for you.”
He took the bone and saw Nina had carved and painted it into an eagle feather. On the upper right side she’d emblazoned a medicine wheel. “Protection from your demons until you can let them go.”
“Grandmother…” He gazed at the feather-shaped stone in the palm of his hand and fought the burning itch scratching the back of his eyes. The feelings wound so tight inside him wouldn’t form into thought, into words.
“Oh, look, Pajackok, the midnight star is here. Do you hear its song?”
He realized then that he didn’t need to say anything. She already knew his heart better than he did. He sat by her and held her close. With her he watched the midnight star until she shed her robe.
Then, not knowing quite where the consciousness to do so had come from, he sang her spirit home.
THREE DAYS LATER, to honor Nina and all she’d done for him, Kevin headed south and east.
His brother was alive. He had to find him. He had to humble himself and ask for forgiveness. Only then could he stop working so hard at trying to forget the brother he thought he’d killed and the woman he’d loved too much.
“HE CAN’T DO THIS!” Ellen Paxton steamed her way to the sheriff’s desk and slapped the letter down on the blotter. Black spots danced in front of her eyes, colors faded, shapes blurred. She blinked madly, trying to control the body doing its damnedest to remind her of her weakened state. “There wasn’t even a hearing. I didn’t get to speak for the horses.”
And speaking for the horses had become her obsession. She was shaking so badly that, when Chance eased her down into a chair, she couldn’t fight him.
“Now take a deep breath,” he said, “and start from the beginning.”
Hanging on to the collar of Chance’s tan uniform shirt she dragged in a breath and blew it out. Chance was the law in Gabenburg but he was also her friend. If he could help her, he would. “This guy shows up with a trailer and gives me this letter and insists on taking the horses back. They’re nowhere near ready to leave.”
Mentally and physically scarred, the half-dozen horses she’d rescued from the highway wreck were in no shape to travel anywhere. She’d used up a day’s worth of energy sending Bancroft’s errand boy on his way, but she wasn’t stupid enough to think that would end the situation. The weight of that exhaustion finally caught up with her. Her hands fell back onto her lap. “What was the judge thinking?”
“Let me take a look,” Chance said. He leaned his backside against the desk and read the letter.
A ceiling fan stirred the air-conditioned air, keeping the sheriff’s office cool in spite of the June heat blazing outside. Fluorescent light poured from an overhead fixture, drenching the room in white. The muted sounds of radio chatter crackled from a unit behind Chance’s desk. A wanted poster, along with half a dozen notices, were tacked on a corkboard above a bank of black file cabinets. Wire baskets and folders kept everything on the desk contained and neat.
The only thing in the room that added a touch of personality was the portrait of Chance’s family. His wife, Taryn, and his daughter, Shauna, smiled at him from a quilt spread on the grass behind their home.
A pinch of jealousy tweaked at her heart but she brushed it aside. Chance deserved his happiness.
She’d once dreamed of raising horses and babies with her high-school sweetheart, but Kyle was dead, and she was relearning to live. Rubbing the heel of her hand on her chest, she erased the edge of sadness creeping around her heart. Her body’s betrayal made babies unlikely. Besides, the horses were almost more than she could handle.
She glanced at her watch. She flipped her braid behind her back. She rubbed a hand on the thigh of her jeans. Chance’s care was a quality she admired but today his slow reading of the judge’s writ was driving her crazy.
“You’re holding the man’s property,” Chance said finally, letting the letter fall to the desktop. “He wants it back.”
“The horses are too weak to travel.” Her hackles were going up. They did so much too easily since she’d come back to herself. Impatience, not temper. So much wasted time. She couldn’t abide to squander a minute more than she had to.
“Judge Dalton seems to think they’re strong enough.”
Chance’s keen dark eyes were studying her. Irritation twitched her foot into a jittery dance. “But he didn’t give me a chance to show him they aren’t. How can this happen?”
Chance gave a slow shake of his head. “Influence.”
Her stomach churned. Influence had kept her a prisoner in a nursing home for fifteen years. Influence had nearly cost Chance and Taryn their lives a year ago. All because of one man’s greed. Now someone else’s greed was willing to sacrifice six horses who’d gone through hell just for the sake of convenience.
The unfairness of it all was enough to make her want to roar. She swallowed back her outrage. “How can I fight this?”
“Let it go, Ellen.”
Her mouth gaped open. “After all you’ve been through, I thought you’d understand. I thought I could count on you.”
“Ellen—”
“I can’t let it go.” Her voice cracked and her vision was blurring again. “They deserve a voice.” Just as she had.
Chance pushed himself off the desk, scrubbed a hand through his hair, then faced her once again. “I know they mean a lot to you, but they’re not yours. I can’t do anything but follow the law.”
“They’ve been abused.”
“There’s no way to prove that.”
“All it would take is one visit by the judge to see how bad off they are.”
Like a soldier about to face a firing squad, Chance stood ramrod straight. “There’s the other side, Ellen.”
“What other side?”
He hesitated.
“Just spit it out, Chance. I’ve wasted too much time already to worry about couching words because you’re afraid I’m not strong enough to handle them.”
He
