Tomorrow's Sun (Lost Sanctuary) - By Becky Melby Page 0,32
to be just fine,” Jake said, keeping his voice steady and even.
Ben nodded, eyed the young nurse, and glared at Jake. “You can leave now.”
Lexi’s fingers tightened around his. He squeezed back. “I think I’ll stay awhile.”
“If you want to be useful, go pick up Adam at the library.” Beady eyes narrowed under scrubby eyebrows.
Useful. Steel fingers gripped the back of his neck. He didn’t trust himself to answer or even look in the face of the man who stood with his hands on the leather belt curling under the overhang of flesh. Kissing Lexi’s cheek, he whispered in her ear, “I’ll get Adam and we’ll both be back here in fifteen minutes. You’re going to be fine.”
He didn’t have what it took to be a dad. But he didn’t have what it took not to try with everything in him. He turned and walked out through two sets of automatic doors. Yanking open the truck door, he looked down. The backpack was empty.
The cat was gone.
September 3, 1852
“Stay home tonight, Liam. I need you to help with the rendering in the morning. “Mam planted reddened hands on the tie of her apron.
“I have traps set. I can’t leave them.”
“Traps? So early?” She held the speckled blue pot over his cup.
He kept his eyes on the murky coffee swirling like a river current. “Wolf traps.”
Mam made a clucking sound and lifted the iron cornbread pan from the table. “And what are you worried about? That a rabid chicken stealer will suffer if you leave it overnight? Serves it right, I say.”
Coffee scalded his throat, but he couldn’t wait any longer, couldn’t take the chance Da would finish in the barn and come in and enforce her request. Not to defend her, but to hurt the son he claimed was not his. Liam smiled but hid it from his mother. With each passing year, Da’s denial grew more foolish. The face that looked back at him from the drinking barrel on a windless day was a young version of Da, but Liam vowed to spend the rest of his life proving any resemblance to Patrick Keegan ended there. And Da knew it. With a brush of lips on Mam’s creased brow, he snatched his coat from the bench and his musket from the hooks above the door.
The fringe on his sleeves slapped his sides as he sprinted toward the woods. He’d tethered Fallon to the apple tree behind the outhouse, though he’d fought for the shelter of the barn when they’d returned from church. Avoiding Da’s distrusting eyes on these nights had become a game. As he tightened the saddle, he prayed this would be the last time then repented of his prayer. Father, You alone know when this will end. Grant me patience to do Your will. Protect us all this night.
He rode the three miles to the river in prayer. The sky was cloudless, speckled with stars. Only a sliver of darkness at the edge of the moon betrayed its waning. Still low, it hovered over the pines. Shadows stretched from headstones in the cemetery. The light would make the going easy. And treacherous. A coyote howled. Yelps followed. Liam guessed at least five. Sweat trickled down his sides in spite of the cold.
The hair stood on his arms as he neared town, reining Fallon to a walk. “Whoa, boy.” He spoke as much to his racing pulse as to the gelding. On the other side of the river, lamps burned in two of the hotel windows. He crossed the bridge. Fallon’s hooves echoed like drumbeats. Just checking traps. He rehearsed his defense.
A bit early to be trapping, isn’t it? The pelts aren’t thick yet.
Wolves, sir. Fear conjured the outline of a gun. They’ve become a nuisance. I get paid for each carcass.
The jacket opened. A .45 caliber Derringer glinted in the moonlight.
Get hold of yourself, Keegan. Liam took off his hat and ran a gloved hand through his hair. God had given His angels charge over his comings and goings thus far. He chastened himself for doubting as he rode silently into the trees across the river from Hannah’s house.
A candle burned in the upstairs window. Her window. But tonight she wouldn’t be sitting at her desk. He slid off Fallon, tied the reins to a skinny birch then hoisted the saddlebags over his shoulders. Did Mam wonder if she was losing her mind when every few weeks a loaf of bread would disappear from the cupboard or