Years of fraud. Building contracts all over the territory. And look here.
He pointed to a list of names. Burnett wasn’t working alone. He had partners.
In the territorial government. In the banks. Even in the courts.
Clara’s face went pale. My god. Thomas wasn’t killed because of one church project.
Eli closed the journal carefully. He was killed because he found evidence of a criminal conspiracy that reaches all the way to the capital. Then we’re dead.
Clara breathed. If Burnett knows that journal exists. Does he? He’s been looking for something.
Ever since Thomas died. He’s come to the house three times asking about Thomas’s papers. Offering to buy them.
Then threatening. Clara’s hand found Eli’s arm her grip surprisingly strong. Last week he gave me an ultimatum.
Sell him the farm by New Year’s Day or he’ll have my daughters declared wards of the territory. He’s got a tame judge in Cheyenne. It’s already been arranged.
Four days. They had four days before Silas Burnett destroyed what was left of this family. Mama? Lily’s small voice cut through the tension.
Is the bad man gonna take us away? Clara couldn’t answer. The tears were coming too fast. So Eli did something he hadn’t done in three years.
He made a promise. No, he said his voice steady as stone. No, he ain’t.
How do you know? Eli looked at Rosie at Lily at Clara struggling to hold herself together through fever and grief and a fear no mother should ever have to feel. And he made his choice. Because I’m not going anywhere, he said.
Not today. Not tomorrow. Not until this is finished.
But you said, I know what I said. Eli picked up Thomas’s journal and held it against his chest. I said I couldn’t be nobody’s daddy.
And maybe that’s still true. But I can be something else. What? Lily asked.
Eli’s jaw set into a line that would have been familiar to anyone who’d faced him in a courtroom. I can be the man who makes sure Silas Burnett never hurts this family again. Outside the storm raged on.
But inside that small cabin, something had shifted. Something had begun. And in three days’ time, the entire territory would learn what happened when a broken man found something worth fighting for.
The children didn’t know it yet. Neither did Clara. But Eli Mercer had just declared war.
Clara fell asleep shortly after exhaustion and fever finally pulling her under. Eli sat by the fire Thomas’s journal in his hands while the twins curled up on a mattress in the corner. Lily fell asleep almost immediately, her breath evening out into the rhythm of childhood unconsciousness.
But Rosie lay awake, watching him. Mr. She whispered. Yeah.
Your little girl. The one who died. What was her name? Eli’s throat tightened.
Hope. Rosie was quiet for a moment. That’s pretty.
Yeah. Yeah, it was. Do you still love her? The question hit him like a physical blow.
So simple. So devastating. Every day, he managed.
Every single day. Rosie nodded slowly as if this confirmed something she already knew. Daddy says love don’t stop just cause someone’s gone, she said.
He says it just changes shape, gets bigger maybe. Big enough to hold new people. Eli stared at her.
Your daddy told you this? In my dream, last night, Rosie’s eyes were ancient in her small face. He said you were coming. He said you lost your hope.
He said maybe, maybe you could borrow ours for a while. Borrow ours. Borrow hope.
Eli looked at this strange, quiet child who dreamed of dead men and saw too clearly into hearts that had nothing left to hide. Go to sleep, little one, he said softly. Okay.
She closed her eyes obediently. Then just before sleep took her. Mr. Woo, yeah.
I’m glad you stopped running. The fire popped. The wind howled.
And Eli Mercer sat in the darkness of that small cabin, holding a dead man’s journal, and wondering if maybe, just maybe, he hadn’t been running away from something all these years. Maybe he’d been running toward this. Morning came gray and bitter.
Eli hadn’t slept. He’d spent the night reading Thomas Whitfield’s journal by firelight page after page of meticulous documentation that painted a picture of corruption so vast it made his stomach turn, building contracts with falsified materials, inspection reports signed by officials who’d never visited the sites, money flowing through shell companies and disappearing into accounts that led straight to the territorial capital. Thomas Whitfield hadn’t just been a builder.
He’d been a witness to an empire of theft and lies. And he’d died for it. The fire had burned low when Eli heard Clara stirring.
He closed the journal and turned to find her watching him, her fever-bright eyes clearer than they’d been the night before. You stayed, she said. I did.
Most men would have taken the journal and run, sold it to Burnett for enough money to disappear. Eli met her gaze steadily. I ain’t most men.
Clara studied him for a long moment. Whatever she saw made something shift in her expression. Not trust, not yet, but the beginning of something that might become trust if he earned it.
The girls? Still sleeping. Eli nodded toward the corner where Lily and Rosie lay tangled together like puppies seeking warmth. They had a hard day yesterday.
They’ve had a hard year. The words hung between them heavy with everything they implied. Mrs. Whitfield.
Clara. She pushed herself upright, wincing at the effort. If you’re going to war for my family, you might as well use my Christian name.
Clara then. Eli leaned forward the journal balanced on his knee. I need to know everything.
Not just what’s in these pages, but what happened after Thomas died. Who came to you? What they said? What they threatened? Clara’s jaw tightened. Why? Because I used to be a circuit judge.
I know how men like Burnett operate. They don’t just kill their enemies, they destroy them. Make them look guilty of something so nobody asks questions.
He paused. What did Burnett say your husband was guilty of? Clara’s hands twisted in the blanket. Drinking, she said quietly.
They said Thomas was drunk when he fell. Said they’d found whiskey bottles in his work shed. But Thomas didn’t drink.
Never touched the stuff. His father was a drunk. Beat his mother half to death before he ran off.
Thomas swore he’d never be like that. Clara’s voice cracked. He kept that promise for 32 years, and they made him into a liar with a single planted bottle.
Eli nodded slowly. What else? They said he’d been stealing from the church fund, skimming materials, selling them on the side. Clara’s eyes flashed with sudden, fierce anger.
My husband who couldn’t tell a lie to save his life, who gave away more than we could afford because he couldn’t stand seeing people go without. They turned him into a thief. Did anyone believe it? Some did.
The ones who wanted to. Clara looked away. It’s easier to believe a dead man was corrupt than to face the truth about the living ones running your town.
Eli understood. He’d seen it before. The way communities closed ranks against uncomfortable truths, choosing comfortable lies over justice that might cost them something.
And the ones who didn’t believe it? They’re scared. Clara’s voice dropped. Agnes Miller at the general store.
She was my friend. Still is, I think, but she can barely look at me when I come to town. Her husband owes money to Burnett’s Bank.
One wrong word and they lose everything. The preacher. Reverend Brooks.
Clara hesitated. He’s new. Came about three years ago.
I think he suspects something’s wrong but the church is being built with Burnett’s money. Hard to bite the hand that’s raising your steeple. And the sheriff.
Wade Colton. Something complicated moved across Clara’s face. He was my brother-in-law.
Married to my sister Ruth before she died in childbirth five years back. Was. He’s still family, I suppose.
But family doesn’t mean much when Burnett’s got your livelihood in his pocket. Clara’s voice turned bitter. Wade came to see me after Thomas died.
Stood right there in that doorway and told me he was sorry. Then he told me there wouldn’t be an investigation. Eli felt his jaw tighten.
He said that directly. He said the evidence was clear. Said pursuing it further would only hurt me and the girls.
Said I should take whatever Burnett offered and start fresh somewhere else. Clara laughed but there was no humor in it. Start fresh.
With two children, no money, and a reputation as the widow of a thief and a drunk. Where exactly was I supposed to start fresh? You didn’t leave. No.
I didn’t leave. Clara’s chin lifted. This is my home.
Thomas built it with his own hands. Every board, every nail, every stone in that fireplace. My girls took their first steps on these floors.
I’ll die before I let Silas Burnett take it from us. The words echoed in the small cabin fierce and final. Eli looked at this woman sick, exhausted, barely able to sit up and saw something that reminded him painfully of Sarah.
That same stubborn strength. That same refusal to bend. It had gotten Sarah killed…
