Chapter 3 - The Man Across the Boundary
Odessa recognized Elias’s initials immediately.
She touched them once.
Then pulled her hand away.
“Elias carved his initials into everything.”
“Why would they be on Vain’s running iron?”
“They shouldn’t be.”
Emmett wrapped the iron again.
“We need Sheriff Puit.”
Odessa shook her head.
“Puit declared Elias’s death accidental.”
“That doesn’t mean he was involved.”
“It doesn’t mean he wasn’t.”
They needed evidence.
Not suspicion.
Emmett suggested returning to North Creek.
Odessa refused to let him go alone.
They rode before sunrise.
Near the diversion trench, Emmett found an old collapsed line shack.
Inside lay broken bottles and rusted tools.
Odessa noticed something beneath a loose board.
A leather button.
She picked it up.
Her breathing stopped.
“Elias’s coat.”
She knew because she had sewn that button on herself.
The ravine where Elias supposedly died was nearly two miles away.
If his button was here, then he had reached the illegal diversion before he died.
Emmett searched farther.
Behind the shack, he found an old horseshoe.
The right-front edge was broken.
Rafe’s distinctive track.
Odessa stared toward Ironwood.
“Rafe was here.”
“With Elias.”
A rifle cracked.
Wood exploded beside Emmett’s head.
“Down!”
He dragged Odessa behind the shack.
Another shot struck dirt.
A rider disappeared among the trees.
They pursued but lost him.
Back at Kesler Ridge, Emmett discovered a bullet lodged in his saddlebag.
It had torn through Emiline’s photograph.
He stared at the hole through her faded image.
Odessa saw his face.
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s paper.”
“No, it isn’t.”
He looked at her.
She understood.
That mattered.
They rode into town to see Sheriff Puit.
He listened carefully.
Too carefully.
When Emmett showed him the running iron, Puit’s face tightened.
“You found this where?”
“My barn,” Odessa said.
“And you expect me to believe someone hid evidence there for three years?”
“Yes.”
Puit leaned back.
“Or perhaps Elias owned it.”
Odessa rose so abruptly the chair scraped backward.
“He did not.”
Puit looked at Emmett.
“And a convicted—”
“Accused,” Emmett corrected.
“—rustler conveniently finds an illegal branding iron.”
Emmett understood.
Puit was not going to help.
Outside, Odessa trembled with fury.
Emmett touched her elbow.
“Not here.”
She looked down at him.
For a second, neither moved.
Then her hand covered his.
It was the first touch between them since their wedding handshake.
Neither pulled away immediately.
That evening they hid the running iron beneath a loose board in Odessa’s bedroom.
At midnight, glass shattered downstairs.
Emmett woke instantly.
He grabbed his revolver.
Odessa was already in the hallway carrying a shotgun.
They descended together.
The kitchen window was broken.
Nothing seemed missing.
Then Odessa noticed muddy footprints.
They led to Elias’s old office.
The desk had been searched.
Drawers emptied.
Papers scattered.
Someone had wanted something.
“What?” Emmett whispered.
Odessa stared at the chaos.
Then remembered.
“Elias kept a journal.”
They searched.
Gone.
A sound came from upstairs.
Both froze.
Someone else was still inside.
Emmett climbed slowly.
One step.
Another.
The bedroom door stood open.
The loose floorboard had been lifted.
The running iron was gone.
May you like
Then Odessa noticed something placed neatly on her pillow.
Elias’s missing wedding ring.
