Keeper of the Books (Keeper of the Books, Book 1) (35 page)

“What have you been doing?” Levi asked.
 

The way Scruff looked away from Levi told him that he had no interest in offering up an answer to that question. Levi knew it was probably something bad and something he didn’t really want to know. He knew Scruff had plenty of shady dealings, but he was still Levi’s brother.
 

Levi shook his head. “I ain’t the person you ought to be apologizing to. You should say something to Alice. She’s the one who agrees to these suppers. She don’t mind that you don’t have something cooked, but when you barely even have food in the house…”

“I know, I know,” Scruff said. “I don’t usually eat at home. You know I’m out and about all the time.”

“I know you are,” Levi said, looking away. “I’ll be back in a little bit. I’m gonna buy some steak cuts. Ought to be a good night by the end of it. Try to play with the kids. Try to relax yourself a little.”

Scruff nodded, though he still seemed like he was somewhere else. He shook his head back to reality and handed Levi a few coins.
 

“For the meat,” he said.
 

“I don’t need it,” Levi said.
 

“Well, seeing as it was me who messed up, it’d make me feel better if you took it.”

Levi shook his head and dropped the coins into his pocket. He was about to pull away when he saw a few riders in the distance. They came in a cloud of dust that kicked all around them, whooping and hollering. Scruff stepped away from the cart and held his hands up in the air.
 

“Oh, Scruff, you sure showed them who was boss!”

“Woo buddy, that was some shootin’!”

Scruff looked back at Levi sheepishly and swallowed. He then turned to the other riders. “Listen, fellas, my brother and his family is over for the evening.”

“Oh, don’t mind if we do!” the lead horseman bellowed out. “What’s for supper?”

“No,” Levi said involuntarily.
 

Scruff nodded at him and waved him off. “Fellas, it’s just me and the family tonight. I’ll see the rest of ya’ll in the mornin’.”

The first rider snarled and spat on the ground. “Fine,” he said. “Come on, boys. Let’s ride into town and git us a drink!” He looked back at Scruff before they moved out. “Good to see ya, boss.”

Scruff didn’t say anything until the riders were out of earshot and down the road a ways. He tried to pretend not to see the look of disapproval in Levi’s eyes, but it was too late.
 

“I don’t know why you hang around people like that,” Levi said.
 

“It ain’t a choice,” Scruff said. “It’s part of the business.”

“And what business is that?” Levi said, leaning forward.

“Well, it ain’t none of your business!”

Levi sighed and didn’t say anything before slapping the reins. The horse lurched forward and he was off toward town to pick up meat for supper, traveling through the clouds of dust scattered about by Scruff’s gang of misfits.

Levi was well aware of Scruff’s reputation. He knew that to some he was a dangerous man. But that wasn’t the case when it came to Levi and his family. If there was one thing about Scruff, he was loyal. He’d do almost anything for Levi, and he’d do almost anything for Alice and the children. So, even when Levi saw the band of no-good crooks he liked to be around, he knew Scruff would play nice around his family and wouldn’t put them in jeopardy. Scruff would just as soon put a bullet through one of those men before he’d let them look at Alice wrong.

Despite the life Scruff lived, he was family. No, Levi had never accepted Scruff’s way of life, and he’d let his brother know it just about every chance he got, but he never let that destroy the strong bond they’d always had. That was why Levi started these dinners. For the last few years, he thought they’d been growing apart. The deeper Scruff got into his shady dealings, the further away he was drifting. Levi didn’t like it, so he tried this out. However, it seemed that even this was a struggle these days.

Levi was a mere vegetable farmer. That’s all anyone in these parts really was. He owned a small plot of land about a mile up the road and about another mile from town. The crops hadn’t been so good this last harvest, but the family was getting by. He was too proud to ask for money from his brother who had somehow amassed a fortune over the last few years. He couldn’t count how many times Scruff had offered him money, but Levi never took it. Exceptions only included things like forgetting to buy meat for dinner. But even then Levi didn’t like the idea of taking money from his brother. For one, the money more than likely belonged to someone else. Levi knew of Scruff’s reputation of loaning out money and collecting a high interest. He was an alternative to a bank that was too scared of risk. In Scruff’s case, the risk was often too scared of him.
 

Another thing, Levi was too prideful and wasn’t afraid to admit it. He’d built his own little farm and it was enough for his family. He didn’t need anything from anyone.

Most of the shops were closing when he reached town, but thankfully Levi was friends with the butcher, Tad. Levi was relieved to see Tad still at his shop. Even though the doors were locked, Tad was more than happy to open it up for his good friend.

Levi took a few minutes to look over his options. He asked Tad what he thought and considered the man’s suggestion. He ended up picking one of the cheaper cuts. Not too cheap. He’d let Alice work her magic into making it something better than it was.

The ride home was colder than the way to town. Windier too. And with the wind there was a faint smell of smoke in the air. It wasn’t the same smell as a campfire or smoke from a chimney. And instead of the smell getting fainter as he moved along, it got stronger and stronger. Then, when he saw the orange ball of flames in the distance, his heart started pounding.
 

He slapped the reins over and over until his horse was in an all out sprint and the wagon axles threatened to break into pieces.
 

There was something in him, some kind of hope, that said over and over that it wasn’t Scruff’s house. It couldn’t have been. But the closer he got to it, the more he knew his thoughts were lies of desperation.

The entire house was engulfed in flames. His eyes scanned the yard for any sign of Alice, the children, or Scruff. But he only caught a glimpse of one person, standing there like a statue.
 

The wagon hadn’t even stopped before Levi jumped out. For a brief second he was frozen in place as he stared at the individual in the yard. The man had a young face. Tears streamed down his eyes, though his expression showed anger more than sadness.
 

Levi knew this boy. This was James R. Cole’s son, Nathaniel. Levi’s mouth hung open as if he wanted to ask what happened, but instinct took over his body and he turned away from Nathaniel and sprinted in toward the house.
 

The flames licked at his clothes and seared his skin as he went in through the doorway. There was so much smoke that he couldn’t see a thing. The clouds burned his eyes and lungs, but he had to ignore it. None of his family had been in the yard. Surely they weren’t still in the house.
 

He got on his hands and knees and tried to call out their names, but the smoke choked him out. He could barely get a breath much less yell out. That’s when he saw his brother’s scorched body on the ground. Most of him was on fire, but there was clearly a bullet wound in his chest.
 

Levi didn’t have time to think. He pushed through every door into every room, ignoring the fact that he couldn’t breathe. Finally, he found them. Huddled together in a corner, his family lay motionless. Alice had her arms around their three children almost as if to try and shield them from something.

He grabbed their nearest child, their only son, knowing he didn’t have the strength to take them all. Levi rushed out of the house with his lifeless boy in his arms.
 

He didn’t have time to look around. He didn’t have time to do anything. He set the boy on the ground as softly as he could and then doubled over, coughing and spewing, trying to compose himself enough to go back in for the others.
 

When he finally collected himself enough to go back inside, the roof of the house caved in, sending a shower of sparks up into the air, blocking any way in or out. The rest of his family was gone forever. He knew this in his heart and the reality choked him worse than the smoke.
 

He looked down at his boy and tried to revive him. He tried to breathe air into his lungs, but there was nothing he could do to get his heart going again.
 

Levi buried his face into his boy’s hair, wailing as much as his blackened lungs would allow.
 

He didn’t know how long he sat there in the yard. When he had the mind to look, Nathaniel Cole was nowhere to be seen. He’d run off. Levi didn’t know the young man well, and he surely didn’t know why he’d done this.

It would be days before he found out that Scruff had inadvertently killed Nathaniel’s mother and fiancé earlier that evening. But Levi didn’t care about the reasons. A man had come into his life and destroyed it, and annihilated everything he held dear.

Naturally, Levi would have to kill him for it.

Autumn, 903 A.O.M.

The four of them traveled restlessly through the next day at a speed too strenuous for Alban’s horse and on a terrain too uneven for the wooden cart carrying the passengers. Nate feared they would end up stranded on the road and that they would have to leave all their belongings where they stood. Then they would have to travel by foot, abandoning the road to make their own path through the woods. If that happened, their tracks would be even easier to spot and Levi and the Rangers would be on top of them in no time.
 

But the horse didn’t die of exhaustion, and the wagon held together just fine. It was late into the night when they stopped to make camp. They felt good about making a fire and serving up hot food. Nate had been apprehensive about the fire at first, but Alban suggested that if the Rangers were close enough for them to spot the fire, then they would undoubtedly find their wagon. Nate eventually agreed with this assessment and helped build the fire.
 

The group ate and talked for a while. They talked about what awaited them outside Tel Haven Forest—the new challenges they would face. They tried to come up with contingencies to every problem that arose in their long conversation, but more obstacles presented themselves with every problem solved. Eventually, the others decided on sleep after Nate offered to take the first watch.
 

He had no intention of waking any of the others to replace him. For some reason his mind wasn’t tired, though he felt it in his muscles and bones. The fire next to him was warm and calming but he was aware of everything going on around him. Every cricket that chirped. Every creature that crawled in the distance. Every branch that danced in the wind. Nate noticed them, guessed what they were and was calmed.

He wasn’t startled when two hours into his watch, Rachel sat up from her sleeping position and scooted in toward the fire. Nate could hear the steady breaths of Marum and Alban, affirming that the two were soundly asleep.

“Uncomfortable?” Nate asked.
 

Rachel shook her head. “Just thinking.”

“I don’t often ask this when someone tells me that they’re just thinking,” Nate said. “People usually like to keep their thoughts to themselves. But…” he raised his palms in the air and looked all around him, “seeing as I don’t have a lot to do or talk about, may I ask what you’re thinking about?”

“You, Mr. Cole,” Rachel said.

Nate was surprised by the answer. He had expected her to say something along the lines of
the road ahead
or
I’m worried we’re in over our heads,
but not
you
.
 

“Oh?” came his response.
 

“I’ve heard a couple of times now that Levi Thompson is out for revenge,” she said. “Against you. I just can’t help but wonder what it is you did to him that made him so angry.”

Nate stared into the smoldering coals with words coming to his mind that he had never let escape his lips. The admission of guilt had always been in his heart, but he had never said it aloud. He didn’t look toward Rachel as he started to talk. He kept his eyes on the fire and let the heat warm his face and chest as he sat patiently in front of it.
 

“Levi Thompson wants me dead and he has every right to,” Nate said.

Rachel looked at Nate when he said this, but he kept his eyes fixed on the coals.

“He had a brother. People called him Scruff. What his real name was, I don’t remember. Maybe it really was Scruff. Anyway, my father had borrowed money from him. Times were hard, you know. He was just trying to keep a small farm going, but he wasn’t a very good farmer. He was a lot better at writing stories. But we ran out of money and we weren’t able to pay Scruff back.”

Rachel scooted toward the fire, her eyebrows turned downward in concentration as she listened to Nate. Nate looked at her for just a second, but turned his gaze back to the coals.
 

“I was engaged to be married back then,” Nate said. “A man usually waited until he had enough money for that kind of thing, but I didn’t. And Abigail didn’t care a thing about money. Neither one of us did.

“My father and I went out to tell Scruff that we couldn’t pay. The man was nice enough about it, which was strange in its own way. We had heard that Scruff was mean. Mean as they get. But he let us go and said not to worry about it.

“That night, me, Abigail, Joe, my mother, and my father, were all enjoying a meal together. At some point in the night, Scruff came shooting at the house. He burned the barns. Slaughtered some animals. Me and my father went out to meet him with our guns ready, but he and his group ran off too quick. And we weren’t about to chase after them. When we came back to the house, my mother and Abigail were both dead.”