Before the Larkspur Blooms (2 page)

“Be quiet.” The sheriff shot his deputy a reproving look. He came around his desk and waited.

“My name is Thom—”

“Donovan!” Dwight blurted. He rocked back on his heels. “I knew you looked familiar. Wait a minute, your twelve years for
rustling aren’t up yet. Why, it’s only been—” He held his hand out and started counting his fingers under his breath.

“Eight,” Thom supplied, after Dwight had started over twice. “Got time off.” It galled him to tell Dwight anything, but soon the whole town would know, so what difference did it make?

Dwight gawked. “Look at you!” He reached out to touch Thom’s tattered shirt, but Thom knocked his hand away.

Dwight’s eyes went wide as nervous tension exploded across Thom’s back.
You better be scared. I’m no longer the same Irish lad you enjoyed pushing around every chance you got.
Countless times during their youth, Dwight, a year older and many pounds heavier, had knocked Thom into the dirt, laughing and calling him names. He’d stolen food from his lunch pail. Messed up his schoolwork. Worse yet, he’d made up lies about the Donovan family, claiming they were broke and living off loans, and he’d even spread unclean talk about Anne Marie, Thom’s baby sister.

Their gazes locked.

A sneer appeared on Dwight’s face. “I could lock you up right now, Donovan. For threatening a deputy.” He gestured to the vacant cell a few feet away. “Want to head back to the clink?” He laughed, but Thom noticed he’d stepped back, giving him space.

“Dwight, be quiet!” the sheriff barked. He took a deep breath, then turned back to Thom. “You’re Loughlan Donovan’s youngest boy?”

“Yes, sir.” Thom stood straight. The encounter with Dwight had his blood pumping hot.
Dwight. A bottle of ink. The new shirt his mother had made, ruined.

The sheriff ran a hand through his hair, then returned to his seat. “That’s right. I got a letter a few months back from the warden saying you’d be getting out soon.” He took a key from his pocket and unlocked a drawer in his desk. He found the letter and skimmed down the sheet. “What’re your plans?” he finally asked.

“The mick sure ain’t staying in Logan Meadows,” Dwight said. “This town is for law-abiding citizens. Not rustlers and thieves.”

The sheriff sighed loudly. “Am I going to have to embarrass you in front of this gentleman, Deputy? Go take a walk so Mr. Donovan and I can have a civil conversation.”

Dwight’s face flamed crimson.

“Go on. And don’t be running your mouth off to anyone who’ll listen. You understand?” Preston waited until Dwight left, then gestured to a row of vacant chairs. “Pull one up.”

Uncomfortably, Thom did. He seated himself and waited to be spoken to, a lesson he had learned well up in Deer Creek. The sheriff seemed fair-minded. He had a good face, kind eyes. Surprising for a man in his line of work. Thom was used to the harsh treatment of guards who were just plain mean. This sheriff seemed different. He was only in his late twenties, a handful of years older than Thom himself, if he were to guess.

“Well? What’re your plans? Do you have any?”

“I’m going out to the farm. My family isn’t aware I’m coming home—that is, unless you’ve told them.” A pained expression on Sheriff Preston’s face made Thom swallow. “There’s always work to be done. Pa’s getting on in—”

“Mr. Donovan—”

“Please, call me Thom.”

“Thom, your pa passed on three years ago. I’m sorry. I should have made sure that you were informed. Your mother about two months ago, right before I got the letter from the warden about your release.”

A knifelike pain sliced through his core.
Ma! Pa! Both…dead?
Thom winced and turned away. He struggled to control his composure, blinking away the moisture gathering in his eyes.
It can’t be.

He stood abruptly and moved to the window, gazing out but not seeing anything. His last memory of his father was the ugly shouting match they’d had the day Thom had left home.

He felt the sheriff’s gaze on his back and realized he had not responded. “What about the rest of them?” His vocal cords
were strangling steel fingers as he struggled to get the words out. “Roland and Anne Marie?”

“Your sister married and went north somewhere. Can’t give you a name or a place. Your brother died several months back, before your mother—shot in the saloon. Some sort of dispute. You’ll find his grave in the cemetery next to your parents’.”

Thom leaned his forehead against the cool glass, not wanting to think. Just like that—the Donovan family all but wiped out. “Eight years is a long time,” he said. “But I wasn’t expecting this.”

“I’m sure you weren’t. Do you have any money?”

Thom shook his head, turned to face the sheriff. “I did plenty of carpentry work while I was locked up but never got paid for any of it.”

“I didn’t think so. That may present a problem.”

“What about the farm? Used to be we weren’t rich, but the place prospered, at least a little.”

“We’ve had a couple of droughts. Your pa seemed to lose his will for farming. When he died, there wasn’t anyone to make the payment. After your mother passed, the title went back to the bank. If a young couple hadn’t just bought it, I’m sure the bank manager, Frank Lloyd, would have tried to work something out with you. The land’s in bad shape.”

So much for starting fresh.

“You’re going to need a way to support yourself.”

Thom glanced at the vacant cells so close by. The doors gaped open like the smile on some ghoulish clown face…mocking, dingy, damp.

“My brother owns the livery and forge and is in the process of expanding. Just yesterday he mentioned something about needing help. I’ll see if he’s willing to hire you. If not, there are other opportunities in town with the possibility of the railroad coming through.”

“I’m much obliged,” Thom said. The ticking of a clock on the wall felt like hammer blows to his heart. “Why are you so willing to help, Sheriff? Me, an ex-convict.”

Albert Preston cocked his head. “Maybe it’s what the warden said, you being so young when your problems started. And I respected your parents. They were good people. Every man deserves a second chance, if he pays for his crime. You’ve paid for yours.”

It really stuck in Thom’s craw. He wasn’t guilty, but there was no way to prove it. Still, he felt compelled to defend himself to the sheriff. “I want you to know I’m innocent of the charges. I didn’t know the Colorado outfit I signed on with was rustling cattle. By the time I did, it was too late.” But Rome Littleton had known. He had hired a scared, fifteen-year-old boy who was trying to outrun his remorse and pain, knowing that they were breaking the law. Littleton had gotten away, while all the others had been strung up immediately. Whether or not they deserved their punishment was between them and God, but for Thom, eight years in the penitentiary was a heck of a price to pay for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“The letter from the warden states that you were shot when the gang was apprehended.”

“That’s right. Before I realized who I was riding with, one of the rustlers drew on the posse that had stopped us. I tried to save one of ’em and took the bullet myself. It was the son of the sheriff I’d saved, and because of that they didn’t hang me with the rest. They took me to a doctor, and from there I was tried and sent up to Deer Creek. The bullet still rests in the base of my skull.”

The sheriff whistled.

“Doctor said it was the thick sheepskin coat that saved my life.”

“It’s still there?”

Thom nodded. “Can’t do anything about it. I could wake up paralyzed or dead at any time. Or I could go blind.” He resisted the urge to reach up and finger the spot he knew so well. “I’d appreciate it if this stayed between you and me. It’s no one’s business but mine. I don’t want anyone’s pity.” Without warning, his stomach growled loudly.

The sheriff nodded, then replaced the letter and locked the drawer. He stood and reached for his black Stetson hanging on the hat rack. “How about some lunch? I don’t know about you, but I have a powerful hunger today. Afterward, we’ll go over to the livery and talk with Winthrop, then ride out to the farm. I’m sure you’d like to see it.”

“I don’t want charity, Sheriff. I’ll work—”

The man chuckled, compassion coloring his tone. “I assure you, I can spare twenty-five cents for your meal. If it will make you feel better, consider it a loan until you can pay me back. You need some meat on those bones.” He settled his hat firmly on his head. “I have a good mind to write that warden and tell him to be a little more generous with the vittles.”

With a heavy heart, Thom followed the sheriff out the door and into the sunlight, amazed again to actually be home, in Logan Meadows. The optimism he had felt at first seeing the Red Rooster was gone. His family, gone. Any hope he may have entertained about his future was all but gone, too. But if the past eight years had taught him anything, it was that he would do whatever it took to survive.

H
ere you are.” Hannah Hoskins set one bowl of stew before Gabe Garrison and the other in front of his friend Jake. She rolled her weight off the sore pads of her feet to her heels and wiggled her cramped toes. The new boots she had ordered would have to wait—business was dismal. She was just scraping by. All she could do was pray that things would pick up when the railroad—
if
the railroad—came through. Until then, she’d have to cut back on everything that wasn’t absolutely essential—like new boots. How she’d rein in her mother’s excessive spending, though, gave her pause.

“Thanks, Hannah. That looks delicious.” Gabe rubbed his hands together, then put his face over the bowl and took an extended whiff, closing his eyes in appreciation. One thing about Gabe, he always appreciated a good plateful of food.

Jake smiled shyly before looking away. Where Gabe was clean-shaven and combed, Jake was wild. Not unkempt, just his own man, as she liked to think. He stepped to a different drum. Local boys now, they had come to town three years ago with Chase and Jessie Logan, and the Logans’ little girl, Sarah. The family had expanded when Shane was born the following year.

Hannah peeked under the napkin in the breadbasket to make sure they had enough biscuits. “Tell Jessie that Markus is over his cold and is full of vim and vigor. Any day she wants to bring Sarah into town to play is fine.”

“Will do,” Gabe mumbled around a mouthful of stew.

Hannah laughed. “You boys always cheer me up. Let me know if you need anything else.”

“We’re hardly boys,” Jake said softly. “I’m nineteen, almost the same age as you.”

Was Jake puffing out his chest? If she didn’t know better, she’d think he was flirting. The gaze he leveled at her stopped her in her tracks, and her cheeks actually felt warm. “I may only be one year your elder, Jake, but don’t forget I’m a mama, too. Because of Markus I’ve grown up fast.” She smiled to soften her words, but before she could say anything else, the door opened.

“I’ll be right with you, Sheriff,” she called as Albert entered the restaurant and hung his hat on the rack. A tall fellow dressed in raggedy clothes followed close behind, and something about him caught Hannah’s attention. Was it the way he walked? Well, solving that mystery would have to wait. While she refilled the water glass of her one other customer, the men seated themselves at the table by the window.

“Susanna,” she called out. “Albert’s here.” The antique Dutch pendulum clock above the wooden sideboard chimed twelve noon. “Can you believe it? He’s right on time.”

Walking over to the table, she said, “Good day, Sheriff.” Then she looked at the stranger, and deep black eyes met hers. A momentary bolt of confusion rocked her.

“I’m hungry as a horse,” Albert replied. “What’re the specials?”

She quickly gathered her composure. “Let’s see.” She looked down at her notepad to break the gaze from those eyes. “Cottage pie topped with breadcrumbs, baked chicken, one order of liver and onions, and the usual beef stew. The latter has lots of meat and potatoes. What sounds good?”

“I’ll have stew. I can smell Gabe and Jake’s all the way over here. What about you, Thom?”