Unwrapping The Rancher's Secret

The way his shoulders slumped, she wasn’t sure if he was disappointed or relieved.

“I—I’ll let you get back to your supper, then,” he said with barely a stutter. “B-but if you change your mind, I’d be obliged if you’d consider my offer.”

She bit the end of her tongue to stifle a promise she’d not be considering his offer now or ever. The fact Winston’s son sat at the dining room table did cross her mind. Briefly, for if by some cruel act of fate, Crofton did end up inheriting everything, she would not remain in Royalton. Watching him blunder Winston’s dream would be as devastating as the deaths she’d just experienced. A shudder made her tense her shoulder muscles. She had not considered that aspect—of what might happen to her if Crofton got what he came after. Where would she go? What would she do?

She hadn’t considered it, because it would not happen. “Goodbye, Samuel,” she said, spinning around to return to the dining room with the momentum of urgency. She would need to find a way to appease the townsfolk until she got herself on solid footing with the lumber mill, and despite Bugsley’s assurance that there was no need for her to speak with Winston’s lawyer, Ralph Wainwright, she would set up an appointment with him. Of course Bugsley hadn’t known about Crofton when he’d told Mr. Wainwright all was under control when the lawyer had come to the house to offer his condolences. None of them had known about Crofton.

Word traveled fast, and by morning she had no doubt everyone would know about Crofton. He had, after all, gone into town.

“Who was it?” Amelia asked as Sara entered the dining room.

“Just Samuel,” she said, taking her seat and waiting until Crofton sat back down before lifting her fork. His manners shouldn’t surprise her—he was Winston’s son. Maybe they irritated her more than surprised her. For that exact reason. That he was Winston’s son.

“What did he need? Had you ordered something?” Amelia asked.

Not answering, Sara turned a cold stare to their guest. “Where did you go this afternoon?”

He finished chewing and swallowed, before stating, “I told you, to see a man about a horse.”

This time around, hearing him use the line Winston often did lit a fireball in her stomach. Although she knew neither was the case, she asked, “What man? What horse?”

His stare remained steady. “The owner of the livery. I had to pay for my accommodations the past few days.”

“Your accommodations?” Amelia asked. “Surely you haven’t been staying at the livery stable.”

He offered Amelia a smile along with a glance. “I didn’t want to intrude, considering the circumstances.”

“Intrude?” Sara spat. “Circumstances?” Anger rarely got the best of her, but today was far from normal. She’d just buried her parents. “Do you think you aren’t intruding now? Do you think the circumstances have changed?”

“Sara!”

She didn’t so much as blink at Amelia’s admonishment. His eyes were locked on hers and she would not be the one to look away first.

“The circumstances changed the moment I rode into town and heard about Winston’s death,” he said.

Fully prepared to get to the bottom of his arrival, she asked, “Oh? Were you coming to see him?”

Leaning back in his chair, he crossed his arms and eyed her quizzically before eventually saying, “I was sure our paths would cross once I arrived.”

“Your paths would have crossed?” She repeated his answer as a question to let it roll around in her head for a moment. If he hadn’t been coming to see Winston, what had he come here for?

Amelia was more straightforward. “If it wasn’t to see your father, why did you come here?”

A smile tugged at Sara’s lips. It was about time Amelia questioned something about him. Sara lifted a brow, as he had earlier, and waited to hear his response.

His silence lingered so long she was just about to concede he wouldn’t answer when he opened his mouth.

“I came here to discover who murdered my friend.”

Regardless of the anger still fueling her system, the stone-coldness of his eyes and the gravel in his voice sent a chill up Sara’s spine.

“Murdered?” Amelia asked. “Here in Royalton? When? Who?”

The naturalness of how he laid a hand over the top of Amelia’s made Sara’s stomach churn. There was a clear connection between Amelia and Crofton. It might have lain sleeping beneath the surface for years, but had returned the moment the two had seen one another. Expecting anything less from Amelia would be impossible. She cared about people, even those she didn’t know, and inside Sara’s troubled mind, she knew Amelia more than cared for Crofton. She loved him. She’d spoken of him often, as if he’d been her own child. His death, or supposed death, had been as painful for Amelia as it had been for Winston.

That realization made Sara’s churning stomach sink. She would have no ally in Amelia when it came to fighting this man for Winston’s dream. Then again, she had no right to fight him. She had no claim to anything of Winston’s. Although she’d loved him like a father, and he’d loved her like a daughter, she wasn’t his rightful heir. Had no legal place to stand.

“Mel’s murder didn’t happen in Royalton,” he said, “but this was the last place he’d been.”

“Mel who?” she asked.

“Barton,” he said meticulously, almost as if it hurt. “Mel Barton.”

“I don’t know of any Bartons in the area,” Amelia said. “Do you, Sara?”

Never taking her eyes off Crofton, for his were still leveled on her, she shook her head. “No.”

“He wasn’t from around here,” Crofton said. “He was my partner. We share—shared several thousand acres of rangeland.”

Knowing the mountainous region around Royalton fairly well, Sara asked, “Where?”

“Arizona Territory,” he answered.

“Arizona!” Amelia squealed. “You live in Arizona and never once came to see me? How long have you been there?”

“About two years,” he answered. “I never came to see you because Winston didn’t want me to.”

A shiver rippled up Sara’s neck at the hint of anger in his tone, but it appeared Amelia didn’t notice it, or at least didn’t care. How could she be so blind to this man and his actions? He clearly didn’t care about her, or his father. He didn’t care about anyone but himself.

“That’s not true. Winston would have been overjoyed to see you,” Amelia said. “Purely overjoyed.”

Although no one had touched their food the last few minutes, Crofton pushed his plate toward the center of the table, as if signaling his appetite had left him. There was a twitch in the center of his cheek as he turned to look at Amelia. “Evidently not. I know you were committed to Winston, and don’t want to believe certain things about him, but my father did not want to see me. Did not want to acknowledge I was alive.”

Sara had her own opinion on that, but this conversation was clearly between Crofton and Amelia, so chose to remain silent. In her mind, though, she couldn’t ignore the fact that Winston would never have denied seeing his son. When Hilton had died she’d seen Winston cry and mourn the child’s death deeply. It had to have been that way when he’d heard of Crofton’s death, too.

With an unusual show of anger, Amelia threw her napkin on the table. “That’s impossible. I won’t believe it for a minute. Not a single one, I tell you. Your father loved you and would have wanted to see you. Don’t you dare sit here and tell me otherwise. I saw the anguish that man went through all those years ago, how it hung with him, and I know how happy he would have been to know you were alive.”

Crofton had remained quiet during Amelia’s fiery outburst, but had pulled a pocketbook out of the suit jacket hanging on the back of his chair, and as soon as she’d closed her mouth, he handed something to her.

Itching to know what was on the slip of paper, Sara leaned closer to the table. From the looks of the tattered edges, Crofton had been carrying it with him for some time.

“What’s this?” Amelia asked.

“Open it.”

She unfolded the paper and frowned as she read whatever it held. Slowly lifting her gaze to Crofton, she opened her mouth and then closed it.

“Speaks for itself, doesn’t it?”

Sara balled her hand into a fist to keep it from shooting across the table to snatch the paper from Amelia. Crofton must have sensed that because he waved a hand in her direction. Following his unspoken command, Amelia handed the piece of paper across the table. Suddenly apprehensive, not overly sure she wanted to know what it said, Sara took the paper gingerly.

Western Union Telegraph Company was printed in large letters across the top along with a paragraph of rules and regulations in much smaller print. Below that, someone had written on the printed lines, noting that the message had been received at 6:48 p.m. on the twelfth of April 1879—more than six years ago—in Baltimore, and that it had been sent from Royalton.

She had to swallow at the lump forming in her throat before letting her eyes go lower. The ink on the well-tattered and thin-at-the-folds note was faded, but readable. It was to M. Hammond, and the message below that was simple.

Impossible. Crofton Parks died years ago. Do not contact me again.

W. Parks.

Handing the paper back to Crofton, she said, “I’m assuming this is a telegraph in response to one sent to Winston. Who is M. Hammond?”

“A judge in Baltimore.”

“Why did a judge in Baltimore send a telegraph to Winston?”

Crofton was in the midst of reasoning how he wanted to answer that question when once again a knock sounded on the front door. He wasn’t so deep in thought he missed a flash of disgust in Sara’s eyes. She could have been disappointed to have their conversation disrupted, but he sensed it was more than that.

“Is that Samuel returning?” Amelia asked. “Did you order something from Wellington’s?”

“No,” Sara answered. “I didn’t order anything from Wellington’s.”

Wellington’s was the mercantile, but that didn’t explain why her hands shook when she laid her napkin on the table.

“I’ll go see who it is,” she said with a ragged sigh.

Crofton waited until she rounded the corner of the dining room before pushing away from the table. He paused in the arched doorway and everything inside him hardened at the sound of a man’s voice. Extending one arm, he braced himself against the narrow wall of the dining room archway and willed his muscles to relax while deliberately capturing Bugsley Morton’s gaze as the man entered the house.

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