Chapter 20
The sun had gone behind the gray clouds by the time Anthony and Abigail crested the last ridge overlooking Silver Cross. They had found their horses not far from the canyon after the fight. Both animals were tired and restless.
Mounting had been a struggle. Anthony wanted her on his horse, but Abigail’s stubbornness won out.
She sat straight in her own saddle, her shirt torn and bloodied where the graze had cut her.
The ride down had been mostly silent. Anthony had checked the wound more times than she liked, but she had tolerated it because she saw how tightly he carried the worry.
She had insisted on returning to the clinic after insisting that she had tools there. But as they reached the edge of town, a different silence wrapped around them. It was thicker and unnatural. Smoke hung in the air, carrying the sting of charred wood.
Abigail slowed her black Thoroughbred, her breath catching.
“Anthony . . .” she said. “Do you smell that?”
He already had. His gut had been tight since they’d seen the first curling thread of smoke rising from the cluster of buildings. He didn’t answer. Instead, he simply urged Spirit forward.
When they turned past the bend of a big boulder, the truth hit. Abigail’s clinic stood in blackened ruin. The windows gaped like hollow eyes, shutters sagged, and charred beams jutted skyward like broken ribs. Smoke still smoldered in places.
Abigail froze. She dismounted stiffly, boots hitting the ground harder than she meant. Pain jolted through her side, but she ignored it. Her hands shook, fists clenching and unclenching at her sides.
“No . . .” she whispered. “No!” She ran forward, stumbling over ash and debris and shoving aside a half-burned timber with bare hands.
“Abigail—” Anthony caught her arm, pulling her back as sparks flared. “Careful. The embers aren’t dead.”
“I don’t care!” She twisted free, wild-eyed. “Everything I built . . . Anthony, it’s all gone!”
He stayed close, letting her rage and claw through the wreckage, even as her hands came away blackened and blistered. He knew better than to stop her outright. Some pain couldn’t be bottled.
Finally, she collapsed to her knees in the ashes, coughing from the smoke. “Why? Why would they—”
Anthony scanned the area with his jaw tight. There were no people in the area. Perhaps this wreckage might have been more of a spectacle if it had been centered on the main street of the town.
Vanburgh’s men had made their message clear. This wasn’t just fire; it was intimidation.
“They wanted to break you,” Anthony said, his voice low but steady. “Break us both. But fire can’t burn truth.”
Abigail looked up at him, eyes wet but blazing with anger. “Truth doesn’t matter if the evidence is gone, Anthony,” she said. “Those papers . . . my father’s notes on the clinic . . . the deeds . . . they were in my office.”
Anthony crouched beside her, resting a hand on her shoulder. “Not if your father was half as careful as you are. A man like him wouldn’t put all his faith in one box of papers.”
She shook her head, lips trembling. “I don’t—”
But then she froze. Her gaze shifted, narrowing toward the far corner of the collapsed wall, where a section of stone foundation had held firm.
“My father . . .” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “He told me once . . . back when I first took over the clinic . . . that if I ever needed what was most important, I should look where the fire couldn’t reach.”
Anthony followed her line of sight. “Stone foundation.”
Without another word, Abigail scrambled toward it, coughing as the smoke thickened. Anthony went after her, yanking a beam out of the way so she could squeeze past. They dug, hands raw and blackened, until Abigail’s fingers struck iron.
Her breath caught. “Here!”
Together, they heaved the small, scorched trunk free from beneath the fallen rubble. The lock was blackened but intact. The metal was warm under their palms. Abigail’s hands shook as she brushed soot from the lid.
Anthony drew his knife and wedged it into the lock. With a sharp twist, the metal groaned and gave way.
Inside, they found folded papers—legal documents, maps, deeds. They were all safe. Beneath them, an envelope was sealed with wax. The edges were browned but not burned. Abigail lifted it reverently, the handwriting across the front instantly familiar.
Her lips trembled as she read the name. “It’s . . . it’s from my father.”
Anthony stepped back, giving her space. In the glow of the smoldering ruins, Abigail broke the seal with careful fingers.
She didn’t speak at first. She just read the letter, her eyes darting back and forth across the page. Her face shifted from grief to shock.
Finally, she looked up at Anthony, her voice thick with emotion. “He knew,” she said. “He knew Vanburgh would try to take it all. And he made sure I’d have the proof I needed. These deeds . . . they aren’t just mine. They’re tied into a trust. Joint ownership.”
“Best read it properly,” Anthony said. “All the way through.”
Her eyes flicked to him, guarded. “I already know what it says. My father wasn’t the kind to waste words.”
“Then let’s hear them,” Anthony said. His hand brushed the lid of the iron box. “Buildings burn. Ink don’t.”
For a long second, she just stared at him. Her hands trembled slightly as she looked back at the letter. She cleared her throat and began to read aloud.
“To my daughter, Abigail,” she started. “If you are reading this, then fate has caught me before my work was finished. Know this . . . Eagle Rock is not just land. It is heritage. It is trust.”
Anthony held his breath as he listened.
“During the war, I entered into a joint claim with Elias Redhawk and with Anthony Hawk’s father, Charles.
Together we bound our rights in law so that no single man could break it.
The deeds herein are true copies of the trust. By that trust, Eagle Rock and its wealth belong in equal part to our families and to Redhawk’s heirs.
No court of honest standing can deny it.
Keep it safe. Keep it honest. Let no tyrant unmake what was bound in good faith. ”
Silence followed. Only the hiss of smoke and the crack of collapsing timber broke it.
Anthony blinked. “Your father . . . and mine.”
Abigail lowered the page, her lips trembling. “You didn’t know?”
He shook his head slowly. “My father never spoke of this,” he said.
“He died in the Mexican War. All he told me was to follow the veins west, that there was something in Eagle Rock worth the trail.” He let out a hard breath, rubbing the back of his neck.
“I thought he meant gold,” Anthony said. “Not this.”
Abigail looked back at the letter, then to the folded deeds with their cracked wax seals. “It means Eagle Rock isn’t mine alone. It’s yours too. By law.”
Anthony picked up one of the deeds carefully, the ink faded but the signatures still bold. Her father’s steady hand, Redhawk’s mark, and his own father’s script were beside them. He set it back down reverently.
“Vanburgh’s claim don’t amount to a hill of beans,” he said. “Not if we stand on this.”
“You know as well as I do, law in this county bends to the weight of Vanburgh’s purse.”
“Then we force him to bend it in daylight,” he replied. “This trust . . . it’s a knife in his ribs. Even if the judge is bought, the people will see. And Vanburgh can’t bury the truth forever.”
Her hands tightened around the letter, knuckles pale. “Every time I stand, he knocks me down,” she said. “When I heal the men he maims, he burns my clinic. When I fight him with words, he drowns me in laughter. And now even with this . . . I hear that laugh already.”
Anthony leaned closer. “Laughter ain’t winning, ma’am. A man laughs when he thinks he’s untouchable. But this . . . this says he ain’t. This says Eagle Rock belongs to us. Together.”
She stared at him for a while. Then her gaze softened as her thumb brushed over her father’s faded script. Slowly, she folded the letter and set it back atop the deeds.
“Then we take it to court,” she said. “Force him into the open.”
Anthony exhaled, some of the tightness leaving his shoulders. “Yes, ma’am. We do it together.”