Chapter 6 - The Woman Jonas Buried
Jonas did not move.
Caleb did.
He raised his revolver.
“Who are you?”
The woman’s face crumpled.
“Caleb.”
“Answer.”
“Elizabeth Hargrave.”
Jonas’s stomach twisted.
His mother had been buried twenty-three years ago.
He remembered the coffin.
The flowers.
His father standing beside the grave.
He remembered touching frozen earth with twelve-year-old fingers.
“No,” Jonas said.
The woman looked at him.
“You still rub your thumb against your palm when you’re frightened.”
Jonas looked down.
He was doing exactly that.
She continued.
“When you were six, you hid beneath the kitchen table because you broke your father’s compass.”
His throat tightened.
“Stop.”
“You called Caleb ‘Bean’ until he threatened to put a frog in your bed.”
Caleb lowered the gun slightly.
“No one knew that.”
“I did.”
Jonas walked onto the porch.
“What happened?”
Elizabeth Hargrave looked toward the trees.
“Inside.”
The cabin smelled of coffee.
She had lit every lantern.
As though darkness frightened her.
Ellie sat opposite her.
Jonas and Caleb remained standing.
Elizabeth explained.
She had not died.
Not naturally.
Jonas’s father had discovered that men connected to Pembroke’s father were using the Evernight mine to launder money from fraudulent land deals.
Elizabeth had found the records first.
They threatened her children.
So Jonas’s parents staged her death.
The coffin contained stones.
She left Colorado under another name.
Jonas’s father remained behind to protect the boys.
“Why didn’t you come back?” Jonas asked.
His voice was hollow.
“Because they watched your father.”
“For twenty-three years?”
“Until he died.”
“You could’ve come then.”
“I tried.”
“When?”
“Before Evernight collapsed.”
Caleb went pale.
Elizabeth looked at him.
“I was there.”
“What?”
“I came back secretly. Caleb found me.”
Jonas turned to his brother.
“You knew?”
Caleb’s eyes filled with shame.
“For one day.”
“One day was enough.”
“I was nineteen.”
“You let me bury everyone alone.”
“I was trying to protect you.”
Jonas laughed.
A broken sound.
“Everyone keeps saying that.”
Ellie reached for his hand.
This time he allowed it.
Elizabeth continued.
The collapse forced her underground again.
Caleb survived because he had been in a secondary tunnel.
Elizabeth helped remove him through an old ventilation shaft before Pembroke’s men could find him.
They believed Jonas would be safer if he believed Caleb dead.
Jonas stood.
“I’m done.”
“Jonas—”
“No.”
He walked outside.
Ellie followed.
He stood beside the barn staring at the mountains.
She approached slowly.
“You don’t have to forgive them tonight.”
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to feel.”
“Then don’t choose.”
He turned.
“My mother was alive.”
“Yes.”
“My brother was alive.”
“Yes.”
“I spent twelve years in that house thinking everyone left me.”
Ellie’s eyes softened.
“And they were watching.”
“That’s worse.”
She understood.
Loneliness by death was one wound.
Loneliness by choice was another.
Jonas looked toward the cabin.
“I built my whole life around being the last Hargrave.”
Ellie squeezed his hand.
“You aren’t.”
He looked at her.
“No.”
For the first time, there was gratitude in that word.
“You’re not alone anymore,” she said.
Jonas pulled her into his arms.
Ellie held him.
No teasing.
No argument.
He lowered his face against her hair.
“I don’t know how to do this.”
“Do what?”
“Have people.”
“You don’t have to know.”
“I might be terrible at it.”
“You already are.”
He laughed against her hair.
She smiled.
Then he kissed her.
This kiss was different from the one on the train.
There was fear in it.
Relief.
Anger.
Hope.
Everything he had refused to feel since childhood.
When they returned inside, Jonas sat.
That was enough.
Elizabeth took it as permission to continue.
“There is something else.”
Caleb groaned.
“Of course there is.”
Elizabeth almost smiled.
“Pembroke’s people are headed for the survey cabin.”
Ellie removed her father’s watch.
“They know about the original deed?”
“They know something is there.”
“How?”
“Martin Shaw.”
Caleb looked at her sharply.
“You know him?”
“I recruited him.”
Silence.
Elizabeth lowered her head.
“Years ago.”
Jonas stared.
“The deputy?”
“He was supposed to watch Pembroke.”
“He worked for you?”
“At first.”
“Then?”
“Money changes loyalties.”
Caleb swore.
They prepared to leave before dawn.
Elizabeth knew a faster trail.
Jonas objected to Ellie coming.
She simply put on his mother’s old coat.
“Are we still debating this?”
“No.”
“Good.”
They rode into the mountains.
The survey cabin stood above the tree line.
Wind tore across the ridge.
They arrived just before sunrise.
The door was open.
Inside, shelves had been overturned.
Floorboards ripped up.
Someone had searched violently.
Caleb went to the fireplace.
He removed three stones.
Behind them was a metal tube.
Empty.
“No.”
Ellie looked around.
“What was there?”
“The deed.”
Jonas saw tracks leading out the rear door.
One set.
They followed.
The trail led toward a cliff overlooking Evernight Valley.
A man stood near the edge.
Deputy Shaw.
He held the metal tube.
Jonas raised his rifle.
“Martin.”
Shaw turned.
He looked exhausted.
“I didn’t want this.”
“Give me the tube.”
“Charles has my family.”
Ellie stepped closer.
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then help us.”
“He’ll kill them.”
“And he’ll kill you when he’s finished.”
Shaw knew she was right.
His hand trembled.
He lowered the gun.
Then a shot cracked.
Shaw jerked backward.
Blood spread across his chest.
He fell.
The tube rolled through snow.
Jonas ran.
Another shot struck the rock beside him.
Caleb fired toward the trees.
Ellie crawled toward Shaw.
He was dying.
“Where’s Charles?”
Shaw coughed.
“Not Charles.”
“Who?”
His eyes moved toward Elizabeth.
Fear.
“Her.”
Ellie froze.
Shaw grabbed her sleeve.
“She started it.”
Then he died.
Ellie slowly turned.
Elizabeth stood ten yards away.
Her face had changed.
No grief.
No fear.
Nothing.
Jonas noticed.
“Mother?”
Elizabeth raised a pistol.
Not at them.
At Caleb.
Caleb’s face went white.
“Mom.”
She pulled the hammer back.
“I’m sorry.”
Jonas stepped between them.
“Put it down.”
Elizabeth’s hand trembled.
“You don’t understand.”
“Then explain.”
“Caleb was never supposed to come back.”
The wind howled across the ridge.
Jonas stared at the mother he had mourned for twenty-three years.
Behind them, another rifle cocked.
May you like
Charles Pembroke stepped from the trees.
And he smiled.
