Fire moved faster than fear.
Within seconds, men poured from the bunkhouse carrying buckets while May rang the iron triangle hard enough to wake the dead.
Garrick ripped open the stable doors.
“Get the horses out!”
Eloin did not hesitate.
Nightfire was already kicking at his stall.
Smoke rolled beneath the rafters.
She covered her mouth with her sleeve and rushed inside.
Garrick grabbed her arm.
“Not him.”
“He won’t follow anyone else.”
“The roof could go.”
“Then stop wasting time.”
She pulled away.
Nightfire reared when she opened the stall.
“Easy.”
His eyes rolled white.
“Nightfire.”
She stepped into his line of sight.
The stallion’s breathing slowed just enough.
Eloin caught the lead rope.
“Come with me.”
Outside, Garrick and Silas fought the fire while ranch hands moved cattle away from the nearest pen.
A burning beam dropped across the stable entrance.
Eloin and Nightfire were still inside.
“Eloin!”
Garrick threw down his bucket.
Silas grabbed him.
“You can’t go through that!”
Garrick shoved him aside.
He kicked at the burning timber until the end shifted.
A black muzzle appeared through the smoke.
Then Eloin emerged beside Nightfire, coughing.
Garrick caught her around the waist as the stallion lunged clear.
For one terrifying moment, Eloin’s weight sagged against him.
“Breathe.”
“I am.”
“You’re insane.”
“Probably.”
“That isn’t funny.”
“I wasn’t joking.”
Despite everything, Garrick nearly laughed.
They saved the stable.
The hay shed was destroyed.
At dawn, a black square remained where winter feed had once been stacked.
Nearly four months of hay was gone.
Garrick stood in the ashes with his hands on his hips.
“Without that feed…”
Silas finished the thought.
“We buy hay at winter prices.”
“Assuming anyone sells enough.”
Eloin looked toward the eastern ridge.
“Calder has hay.”
Garrick’s expression hardened.
“Exactly.”
By breakfast, Garrick had made a decision.
“You’re not taking Thursday’s train.”
Eloin slowly lowered her coffee.
“That sounded dangerously like an order.”
“It was.”
May pretended not to listen.
Eloin folded her hands.
“You have no authority over me.”
“I know.”
“Then try again.”
Garrick clenched his jaw.
He was not accustomed to reorganizing sentences after speaking them.
“Please don’t take Thursday’s train.”
“Why?”
“Because someone burned my hay to frighten you away.”
“That seems like a reason to leave.”
“It’s also a reason I’d rather know where you are.”
Eloin’s eyebrow lifted.
“For my safety?”
“Yes.”
“Only my safety?”
Garrick hesitated one second too long.
May suddenly became intensely interested in buttering toast.
Eloin looked down at her coffee.
“I’ll stay until we understand what Beatrice knew.”
Relief moved through Garrick with embarrassing strength.
They spent the afternoon studying Beatrice’s letters.
Garrick had kept all thirty-two.
Eloin recognized which sentences were hers.
Sometimes entire paragraphs.
Other times only a phrase.
Reading them now created an intimacy neither knew how to handle.
“You wrote this?” Garrick asked.
Eloin looked.
There are some silences that feel like abandonment and others that feel like shelter.
“Yes.”
“I answered Beatrice.”
“I know.”
“You knew my answer?”
“She showed me.”
Garrick’s gaze remained on her.
“And what did you think?”
“That you understood.”
They fell silent.
Later they discovered the first clue.
In one letter written five months earlier, Beatrice had mentioned “Mr. C’s unfortunate investment in Father’s failed western arrangement.”
At the time, Garrick assumed she meant a relative.
Eloin did not.
“My father had one western arrangement.”
“What?”
“A breeding partnership.”
“With Calder?”
“I don’t know. I was sixteen.”
“What happened?”
“Several horses died.”
“How?”
“My father said disease.”
“And you believed him?”
“At sixteen?”
She paused.
“No.”
Eloin stood and began pacing.
“He burned records afterward.”
“Why?”
“He said contamination.”
Garrick looked toward the stable.
“Nightfire.”
She understood immediately.
“A breeding stallion.”
“Calder is damaging breeding stock again.”
“But why?”
“To force sales.”
Eloin shook her head.
“That still doesn’t explain my father.”
They rode into Ridgeway the next morning.
The county records office occupied two rooms behind the courthouse.
Mr. Pritchard, the clerk, complained about dust, stairs, handwriting, and modern laziness before finally agreeing to search old business filings.
Three hours later, Eloin found the connection.
Hartley Breeding Company had registered a Wyoming partnership sixteen years earlier.
The partner was Rufus Calder.
Her hand froze.
Garrick leaned closer.
The document authorized the purchase and resale of breeding horses across Wyoming, Colorado, and Nebraska.
A second record revealed the partnership dissolved fourteen years earlier after claims of fraud.
“Fraud?” Garrick asked.
Pritchard scratched his beard.
“Never proved.”
“Who accused them?”
“Small ranchers mostly.”
Eloin’s face went pale.
“Accused them of what?”
“Selling lame animals. Spreading rumors about competitors. Buying distressed properties cheap.”
Garrick’s voice turned cold.
“How many?”
Pritchard searched.
“Seven ranches changed hands within two years.”
“To who?”
The clerk looked again.
“Companies connected to Calder.”
Eloin stood so quickly her chair struck the wall.
“I need air.”
Garrick followed her outside.
She walked halfway down the courthouse steps before stopping.
“My father helped him.”
“We don’t know how much.”
“I know my father.”
“That isn’t evidence.”
“It’s enough for me.”
Garrick moved beside her.
“Eloin.”
She stared at the street.
“He hurt horses because profit mattered more than suffering.”
“You were a child.”
“I benefited from it.”
“You survived in his house.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
“No.”
His voice softened.
“But it isn’t guilt either.”
She looked at him.
For a moment, all the sharp intelligence disappeared and Garrick saw how tired she was.
“My father died four years ago,” she said. “I thought the worst thing he left me was memory.”
“Maybe he left you a chance to correct something too.”
Before Eloin could answer, Victor Hale emerged from the saloon across the street.
He saw them.
Stopped.
Then turned around.
Garrick immediately followed.
“Victor.”
The man hurried.
Garrick caught him beside the alley.
Victor swung first.
His fist struck Garrick’s jaw.
Garrick answered with one punch to the stomach and another that sent Victor against a barrel.
“Why are you poisoning my horses?”
Victor spat blood.
“Go to hell.”
“Why did you burn my hay?”
“I didn’t.”
Garrick grabbed his coat.
“Who searched Eloin’s room?”
Victor’s eyes flicked toward her.
That was enough.
Eloin stepped closer.
“What did you want from Beatrice’s letter?”
Victor laughed.
“You think that dead girl knew something?”
Garrick tightened his grip.
Victor’s smile vanished.
Then he said, “Ask your foreman.”
Garrick froze.
“What?”
“Ask Silas Boone why Calder knows every move on your ranch.”
Victor shoved free and ran.
Garrick could have chased him.
He didn’t.
Eloin’s voice was quiet.
“Silas.”
“No.”
“He received the poisoned feed.”
“He’s worked for me nine years.”
“He had access to Nightfire.”
“No.”
“He knew where your hay was stored.”
“Everyone did.”
“He knew I was leaving Thursday.”
“So did May.”
“And you.”
Garrick turned toward her.
“Silas is family.”
“That doesn’t make him innocent.”
“And Victor Hale works for Calder. He’d say anything to divide us.”
“Yes.”
That answer stopped Garrick.
“You agree?”
“I agree that Victor’s accusation proves nothing.”
Garrick exhaled.
“But?”
“But we stop telling Silas what we’re investigating.”
They returned after dark.
Silas was waiting.
“Where were you?”
“Town.”
“Find anything?”
Garrick remembered Eloin’s warning.
“Nothing useful.”
Silas nodded.
Too quickly?
Garrick hated that he noticed.
The next morning Eloin devised a test.
She told Silas privately that Garrick planned to move Nightfire to the northern pasture at midnight.
She told May a different story—that Nightfire would be taken to Ridgeway.
She told ranch hand Eli Carter that Nightfire would remain locked inside.
Only Garrick knew the truth.
At eleven thirty that night, Garrick and Eloin waited in darkness beside the northern pasture.
At eleven fifty, a rider appeared.
He cut the fence.
Then poured something along the ground near the gate.
Garrick emerged with his rifle.
“Don’t move.”
The rider bolted.
Nightfire, hidden in another pasture, was safe.
Garrick mounted and chased.
The rider reached the cottonwood grove before his horse stumbled.
He went down.
Garrick arrived seconds later.
Eloin followed.
The man tried to run.
Garrick tackled him.
When he turned him over, Eloin’s breath caught.
It was not Silas.
It was Tom Riker, one of Garrick’s youngest ranch hands.
Nineteen years old.
Terrified.
Garrick stared at him.
“Why?”
Tom began crying.
“My mother owes Calder money.”
“How much?”
“Three hundred dollars.”
“You poisoned my horses?”
“No! I swear. I cut fences. That’s all.”
“The fire?”
“No.”
“Nightfire?”
“No.”
Garrick grabbed his shirt.
“Then who?”
Tom shook violently.
“I don’t know.”
Eloin knelt nearby.
“Tom.”
He looked at her.
“If you were told to cut this fence tonight, who told you Nightfire would be here?”
Tom’s eyes filled with dread.
“I can’t.”
“Who?”
“They’ll hurt my mother.”
Garrick’s voice lowered.
“I won’t let them.”
Tom closed his eyes.
Then whispered one name.
“Silas.”
The world seemed to stop.
Garrick released him.
“No.”
Tom was sobbing now.
“He gives the orders.”
Eloin looked at Garrick.
He had gone completely still.
Nine years.
Winters together.
Cattle drives.
Broken bones.
Silas had buried Garrick’s father beside him.
Then another rider stepped from the trees.
A rifle cocked.
Silas Boone’s voice came through the darkness.
“Tom should’ve kept his mouth shut.”
Garrick slowly turned.
Silas pointed the rifle directly at Eloin.
And said, “Calder warned me that woman was going to ruin everything.”
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