The hearing was scheduled for April.
The baby was due in May.
Nathaniel hated everything about that timing.
For weeks, lawyers and letters invaded their lives.
Gideon Ward’s petition did not directly claim ownership of the unborn child, as Nathaniel had first feared. Instead, Ward argued that because the baby might inherit property left indirectly through Elias, the court should appoint a Ward-approved guardian to protect the child’s financial interests.
The words sounded reasonable.
Nathaniel distrusted them immediately.
“So he starts with the money,” he told Sheriff Bell one afternoon. “Then after the baby is born, he argues that Adeline is unsuitable.”
Bell nodded.
“That would be my guess.”
“What makes a mother unsuitable?”
“Depends on what his attorney convinces a judge to believe.”
“She’s married.”
“Now.”
Nathaniel hated the single word.
Gideon intended to use Adeline’s past against her.
The gossip.
The pregnancy before marriage.
Her failure to disclose it to Nathaniel.
Perhaps even her poverty.
Adeline sat quietly while their attorney, Clara Whitcomb, explained the situation at the kitchen table.
Clara was forty-five, sharp-eyed, and one of very few women Nathaniel had met who could silence him with a raised eyebrow.
“You cannot solve this by punching Gideon Ward,” she told him.
“I haven’t punched him.”
“You’ve considered it.”
“That isn’t illegal.”
“Yet.”
Adeline almost smiled.
Clara turned toward her.
“We need evidence Elias acknowledged the baby before he died.”
“He didn’t know.”
“Letters?”
“None mentioning a baby.”
“Any written evidence of your engagement?”
Adeline nodded.
“He wrote often.”
“That helps establish the relationship.”
“I have the letters.”
“Where?”
Adeline went quiet.
Nathaniel noticed immediately.
“Where?”
“At my aunt’s house.”
Clara leaned back.
“In Laramie?”
“Yes.”
Nathaniel groaned.
“Of course.”
Two days later, Jacob volunteered to retrieve them.
Adeline gave him her aunt’s address and a letter explaining the situation.
He returned four days later with a wooden box.
Inside were thirty-seven letters from Elias Ward.
Nathaniel did not read them.
They were not his.
Adeline spent an evening beside the fire sorting them while Nathaniel repaired harness.
Sometimes she smiled.
Sometimes she cried quietly.
Nathaniel never interrupted.
Finally she held up one letter.
“This might matter.”
Clara returned the next morning.
The letter had been written six weeks before Elias died.
In it, Elias described his intention to marry Adeline regardless of his father’s objections and stated that any future family he built would be his first responsibility.
It did not prove paternity.
But it destroyed Gideon’s argument that Elias had intended to abandon her.
Clara smiled.
“This is useful.”
Nathaniel watched Adeline.
For the first time in weeks, hope appeared.
Then Gideon Ward changed tactics.
Rumors began circulating that Adeline had answered multiple marriage advertisements.
False.
Someone claimed she had been seen in Cheyenne with another man shortly before Elias died.
False.
A woman Nathaniel had never heard of told Finch that Elias privately questioned Adeline’s faithfulness.
Also false.
Nathaniel wanted blood.
Adeline wanted patience.
“Every time you lose your temper,” she told him, “you become the man they say I needed to control.”
Nathaniel stared.
“That doesn’t even make sense.”
“It doesn’t have to. Gossip rarely does.”
She was right.
He hated that most.
So Nathaniel worked.
He repaired fences.
Moved cattle.
Prepared the small room beside theirs for the baby.
He built a cradle from pine.
Adeline discovered it one afternoon.
She stood in the doorway with one hand over her mouth.
Nathaniel immediately became self-conscious.
“It still needs sanding.”
She walked closer.
The cradle was simple but beautiful.
Along the side, Nathaniel had carved tiny mountain peaks.
“You made this?”
“No, a mysterious carpenter broke in.”
She gave him a look.
Nathaniel smiled.
Adeline ran her fingers over the wood.
“Elias once talked about building one.”
Nathaniel’s smile faded slightly.
Adeline noticed.
“I’m sorry.”
“No.”
He shook his head.
“You’re allowed to remember him.”
“I don’t want those memories to hurt you.”
“They do sometimes.”
The honesty surprised both of them.
Nathaniel continued.
“But pretending he didn’t exist would be worse.”
Adeline’s eyes softened.
“This baby comes from a man you loved.”
“Yes.”
“That doesn’t threaten me.”
He rested one hand on the cradle.
“If I’m going to be the father, I have to be strong enough to admit there was someone before me.”
Adeline’s eyes filled.
“You already are the father.”
Nathaniel looked up.
She stepped closer.
“Not because we married.”
Her hand covered his.
“Because you chose to be.”
Nathaniel could not speak.
So he kissed her.
That night, shortly after midnight, the dogs began barking.
Nathaniel woke instantly.
Smoke.
He smelled it before he heard anything.
He was out of bed in seconds.
“Adeline!”
She sat up.
“What?”
“Fire.”
Orange light flickered outside the window.
Nathaniel ran.
The barn roof was burning.
He grabbed buckets while shouting for Adeline to stay away.
She ignored him long enough to ring the emergency bell near the porch.
Jacob, whose property lay closest, heard it.
So did two hired hands sleeping in the bunkhouse.
Nathaniel reached the barn.
Horses screamed inside.
The doors had been barred.
He stopped.
Barred from outside.
Someone had done it deliberately.
“Nate!” Jacob shouted behind him.
Nathaniel ripped the timber free.
Smoke poured out.
“Horses first!”
They entered.
Heat struck like a wall.
Nathaniel released the mare nearest the entrance.
Jacob cut ropes.
Animals bolted into the yard.
Then Nathaniel heard pounding from the rear stall.
Adeline’s favorite mare.
Willow.
He ran deeper inside.
“Nathaniel!”
Adeline screamed from outside.
He ignored her.
A burning beam fell behind him.
The mare kicked wildly.
Nathaniel covered his face, reached the stall, and freed the latch.
Willow charged past.
Then the roof groaned.
Nathaniel turned.
Something struck his shoulder.
He dropped.
For one terrible second, all he saw was fire.
Then Jacob grabbed him.
“Move!”
They stumbled outside as part of the roof collapsed.
Adeline ran toward him.
Blood streamed down Nathaniel’s arm.
She caught him with both hands.
“Are you hurt?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re bleeding.”
“Still fine.”
Her face twisted.
“You could have died.”
“The horses—”
“I don’t care about the horses!”
Every man in the yard went silent.
Adeline immediately looked guilty.
Willow stood safely near the fence.
Nathaniel almost laughed.
Instead he pulled Adeline against him.
She shook in his arms.
“I’m here.”
“You promised.”
“I know.”
“You promised me.”
“I know.”
Fire consumed half the barn before they controlled it.
By dawn, Sheriff Bell arrived.
He walked around the ruins.
Then crouched near the outer door.
“Nathaniel.”
Nathaniel joined him.
Bell pointed toward the ground.
A broken glass bottle lay partly buried in snow.
It smelled of kerosene.
“Arson,” Bell said.
Adeline stood behind them.
Nathaniel’s body went cold.
“Ward.”
Bell looked up.
“Don’t jump ahead.”
“Who else?”
“Someone who dislikes you. Someone angry about the case. Someone drunk. Someone careless.”
“The doors were barred from outside.”
Bell’s expression hardened.
“Yes.”
Nathaniel turned toward Adeline.
She had gone pale.
That afternoon, another discovery came.
One of the ranch hands found tracks near the eastern road.
Horse tracks.
Beside them, partly frozen into mud, lay a brass button.
Sheriff Bell cleaned it.
Stamped on the back were the initials H.F.
Nathaniel stared.
“Horace Finch.”
Gideon Ward’s attorney.
Bell frowned.
“Maybe.”
“You know another H.F.?”
“I know evidence has to survive more than your temper.”
Nathaniel paced.
Adeline remained very still.
Then she said, “Finch wouldn’t burn a barn on his own.”
Bell looked at her.
“No.”
“He’s frightened of Gideon.”
Nathaniel stopped.
“How do you know?”
“Because everyone around Gideon is frightened of him eventually.”
Bell pocketed the button.
“I’ll go to Laramie.”
Nathaniel wanted to go too.
Adeline stopped him.
“No.”
“He nearly burned us alive.”
“And if Gideon arranged it, that is exactly why you should stay here.”
Nathaniel looked at her belly.
Eight months now.
Too close.
He nodded reluctantly.
Three days passed.
Bell returned with extraordinary news.
Horace Finch had disappeared.
His office was empty.
His landlord claimed he left before dawn the morning after the fire.
Nathaniel swore.
But Bell was smiling.
“What?”
“He left papers.”
Nathaniel stared.
“What papers?”
“Copies of correspondence between Finch and Ward.”
Adeline gripped the table.
“About us?”
“Yes.”
Bell removed folded documents.
“Most are ordinary legal matters.”
“And the others?”
“One includes instructions to locate witnesses willing to ‘damage Miss Foster’s standing.’”
Nathaniel’s jaw clenched.
“Another discusses paying a man to swear he saw her with someone in Cheyenne.”
Adeline sat down.
Nathaniel moved beside her.
“And the fire?” he asked.
Bell’s expression darkened.
“Nothing connecting Ward yet.”
“Finch?”
“Not directly.”
Nathaniel cursed.
Bell raised a hand.
“But this destroys the credibility of several witnesses Ward intended to call.”
For the first time, Gideon had made a mistake large enough to matter.
Then Adeline suddenly gasped.
Nathaniel turned.
She gripped his wrist.
“What?”
Adeline’s eyes widened.
A dark stain spread across her skirt.
Nathaniel stared.
The room stopped.
Bell stood.
“Is that—”
Adeline’s face tightened with pain.
“My water.”
Nathaniel went white.
“The baby isn’t due for three weeks.”
The pain passed.
Adeline looked at him.
“Nathaniel.”
He did not move.
“Nathaniel!”
“What?”
“Get the doctor.”
He bolted toward the door.
Adeline almost laughed despite the pain.
“Nathaniel!”
He turned.
“What?”
“You need your coat.”
He looked down.
He was wearing socks, trousers, and no shirt.
Sheriff Bell began laughing.
Nathaniel grabbed the first coat he saw.
Then another contraction hit Adeline.
Her cry stopped every sound in the room.
Nathaniel crossed back to her.
Fear returned.
Not the distant fear of courtrooms or fires.
Something older.
Helplessness.
Adeline took his hand.
“Go.”
He kissed her forehead.
“I’ll bring Pike.”
Then Nathaniel Cole rode into the freezing Wyoming night faster than he had ever ridden before, while behind him the child he had once believed could never belong in his life decided it was ready to enter it.
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