Paying the bank should have ended Nora Greer's troubles.
Instead, it changed them.
The farm was secure.
At least financially.
For the first time in months, Nora woke without calculating debts before her feet touched the floor.
Grace was healthy.
Cole's arm had nearly healed.
Two of the mustangs were sold.
The gray stallion had gone to an experienced rancher who promised to keep Cole's methods rather than force the animal.
Mercy remained.
So did Warren Pike.
Warren stopped visiting.
That worried Nora more than his appearances had.
Men like Warren did not become quiet because they had accepted defeat.
They became quiet because they were planning.
December settled across Kansas.
Grace reached four months.
She had discovered her feet, her voice, and the extraordinary entertainment provided by pulling Cole's hair.
Nora found this hilarious.
Cole did not.
"She has your temperament," he told Nora one morning.
Nora raised an eyebrow.
"She's your daughter."
"Biologically."
"And in every other way."
Grace grabbed his beard.
Cole winced.
Nora laughed.
Their days became domestic in a manner neither acknowledged.
Cole ate every meal in the farmhouse now.
The bunk room still held his bed, but his coat hung beside Nora's near the kitchen door.
His boots sat beside hers.
Grace's cradle remained next to the stove.
One snowy evening, Mabel Hendricks walked in without knocking, stopped, and stared.
Nora was rocking Grace.
Cole was repairing a wooden toy at the table.
A pot of stew simmered.
"What?" Nora asked.
Mabel slowly smiled.
"Nothing."
"Your nothing is irritating."
"I was just wondering when you're planning to admit what's happening."
Cole looked up.
Nora frowned.
"What's happening?"
Mabel laughed so hard she had to sit down.
Later, after she left, an uncomfortable silence remained.
Cole focused intensely on the toy horse.
Nora washed the same bowl far longer than necessary.
Finally Cole said, "People talk."
"They always do."
"Does it bother you?"
"What part?"
He looked at her.
Nora turned away.
Before either could continue, someone pounded on the door.
This time there was a knock.
A hard one.
Cole stood.
Nora opened the door.
Sheriff Amos Bell entered with snow on his shoulders.
His expression was grave.
"We found something."
"What?"
"About Mercy."
Cole stepped closer.
The sheriff handed him a folded document.
"Colorado brand registry."
Cole read.
Nora watched his face.
"What?"
"Mercy's scar."
"What about it?"
Cole walked toward the lamp.
The black gelding had a thick scar high on his left hindquarter.
Cole had always believed it came from abuse.
The sheriff pointed to a sketch.
"Brand was burned over."
Nora understood slowly.
"Someone changed his brand?"
"Years ago."
"Who owned him?"
Amos hesitated.
"Man named Aaron Sutter."
Cole went completely still.
Nora looked at him.
"Sutter?"
The sheriff nodded.
"Cole's father."
Silence.
Nora turned.
"You knew?"
"No."
Cole's voice sounded distant.
"My father died when I was fourteen."
Amos explained.
Aaron Sutter had bred horses in Colorado before moving east.
After his death, several animals disappeared while the estate was being settled.
Mercy had likely been one of them.
"How old is he?" Nora asked.
"About twelve," Cole said.
He stared toward the barn.
"I remember a black colt."
His voice changed.
"My father called him Midnight."
Nora's skin prickled.
"You're sure?"
"No. But..."
Cole walked outside without a coat.
Nora followed.
Mercy stood in the stall.
Cole approached.
The horse turned.
Cole whispered something.
Mercy moved toward him.
Nora stopped.
There was something powerful in the sight.
A man who had spent nearly two decades drifting from one place to another.
A horse stolen from the only childhood home he had known.
Both somehow ending up on Nora Greer's farm.
"Who sold him to Matthew?" Cole asked.
Nora thought.
"Trader named Vance."
"Last name?"
"Carrow. I think."
Sheriff Amos swore softly.
Cole looked over.
"You know him?"
"Warren Pike's former partner."
The pieces aligned.
Warren had not challenged Mercy's ownership because the horse belonged to him.
He had challenged it because evidence of the horse's history could connect his business partner to theft.
Potentially Warren too.
Amos investigated.
Within a week he discovered old sale records.
Vance Carrow and Warren Pike had traded livestock together for years.
Several animals appearing in their ledgers corresponded with horses reported stolen from estates and small ranches.
Warren had built part of his wealth on livestock acquired through questionable means.
Mercy was evidence.
The fence cutting.
The theft attempt.
The shooting.
It suddenly made sense.
Warren became desperate.
Two nights later, Nora woke to smoke.
She sat upright.
For one confused second, she thought she was dreaming.
Then she heard Cole shouting.
"Nora!"
She ran downstairs.
Orange light flickered through the kitchen window.
The barn.
Fire.
Nora screamed.
"Cows!"
Cole was already running.
Nora grabbed her coat and followed.
Flames climbed the eastern wall.
The dairy cows bellowed inside.
Cole opened the main doors.
Smoke rolled outward.
"Stay back!"
"Absolutely not."
"Nora!"
"Those animals are my livelihood."
Together they opened stalls.
Cows rushed into the snowy yard.
One nearly knocked Nora over.
Cole pulled her aside.
"Grace!"
"Kitchen cradle."
"Go!"
Nora hesitated.
"Go!"
She ran.
Grace was awake and screaming.
Nora wrapped her in blankets and carried her outside to the far pasture gate.
Mabel, alerted by the glow from her farm, arrived with neighbors.
Buckets formed a line.
Snow was thrown against flames.
The barn roof groaned.
"Mercy!" Cole shouted.
Nora turned.
The black gelding remained inside the rear stall.
Fire blocked the central aisle.
"No!"
Cole ran toward the side entrance.
Nora caught his arm.
"You can't!"
"He'll die."
"So will you!"
Cole looked at her.
Something raw crossed his face.
Then he broke free.
He disappeared into smoke.
Nora stopped breathing.
Seconds passed.
Then twenty.
Thirty.
The roof cracked.
"Cole!"
Nothing.
Nora handed Grace to Mabel.
She moved toward the barn.
Mabel grabbed her.
"Don't you dare."
"Cole's inside."
"And Grace is here!"
Those words stopped Nora.
She looked at the baby.
Grace cried.
Nora stood trapped between two terrors.
Then Mercy burst through the side doors.
Cole clung to the lead rope, coughing violently.
Nora ran.
They collapsed together in the snow.
Mercy galloped clear.
Nora hit Cole's chest.
"You idiot!"
He coughed.
"Ow."
"You absolute idiot!"
"Still ow."
Nora was crying.
Cole reached up.
"Nora."
She kissed him.
There was no decision.
No permission.
No careful thought.
She simply kissed him.
For one startled second, Cole did not move.
Then his hand touched her face.
The world around them disappeared.
Fire.
Snow.
Neighbors.
Everything.
When they separated, Nora stared at him.
"I thought you were dead."
"I'm not."
"Don't ever do that again."
"Save a horse?"
"Scare me."
Cole's expression changed.
"I'll try."
The barn burned until morning.
Half was destroyed.
But all eleven cows survived.
So did Mercy.
And investigators found something beside the eastern wall.
A kerosene tin.
Boot prints led toward the road.
One print showed a distinctive heel plate.
Sheriff Amos recognized it.
He had seen the same repair on boots worn by Warren Pike's foreman.
This time there was evidence.
The foreman was arrested.
Within twenty-four hours, he confessed.
Warren had ordered the fire.
He had also ordered Mercy stolen weeks earlier.
The shooting, he insisted, had not been planned.
One of the men panicked when Cole pursued them.
Warren Pike was arrested before sundown.
The county that had spent months gossiping about Cole and Nora now had something far more interesting to discuss.
A wealthy rancher accused of arson, livestock theft, conspiracy, and fraud.
Nora should have felt triumph.
Instead she stood beside the burned barn the following morning and cried.
Cole approached quietly.
"Insurance?"
"Not enough."
"We'll rebuild."
She looked at him.
"We?"
The word hung between them.
Cole glanced away.
"If you want."
Nora stared at the blackened beams.
"About last night."
"The fire or the kiss?"
She looked sharply at him.
Cole almost smiled.
Nora did not.
"I don't know what I'm doing."
"Neither do I."
"I'm still Matthew's wife in my head sometimes."
"I still wake expecting Clara beside me."
Nora looked at him.
"Then what is this?"
Cole approached slowly.
"I don't know."
He stopped close enough that she could see the faint scar near his jaw.
"But I know I don't want to ride away."
That mattered.
Cole Sutter, who had spent eighteen years leaving every place he worked.
"I don't want you to either," Nora whispered.
He touched her hand.
That was all.
No promises.
Not yet.
Behind them, Mercy grazed in the snow.
And from the farmhouse, Grace began to cry.
Nora smiled.
"Duty calls."
Cole sighed.
"Your baby."
Nora started toward the house.
"Funny. Yesterday she was yours."
Cole followed.
By the time they reached the porch, they were both laughing.