Chapter 5 - The Locket Hidden in Her Dress
Rowan did not tell the story immediately.
He checked the windows first.
Then the stable.
Then the trail.
Only when Caleb and his men were truly gone did he return.
Eliza waited at the table.
Her father's medallion lay beside her own locket.
Two pieces of silver.
Two halves of a history someone had worked very hard to bury.
Rowan poured coffee.
His hand was steady.
Eliza's was not.
“You knew Caleb.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“We guided freight together.”
“For how long?”
“Almost a year.”
“And my father?”
“I met Thomas only once before the storm.”
Eliza frowned.
“Where?”
“Fairplay.”
Rowan sat.
“Your father hired three wagons to carry machinery to a mining camp. Caleb organized the route. I was hired as guide.”
“Was Caleb already married?”
“No.”
That should not have mattered.
It did.
Eliza imagined a younger Caleb.
Before her.
Before six years of apologies and slammed doors.
“What was he like?”
“Charming.”
The word landed heavily.
Eliza gave a humorless smile.
“Yes.”
“Ambitious.”
“Yes.”
“Angry when men didn't recognize how important he believed he was.”
Eliza looked down.
“Yes.”
Rowan continued.
“Your father didn't trust him.”
“Why?”
“Thomas noticed shipments disappearing.”
“What kind?”
“Tools. Powder. Silver ore.”
“Caleb stole from him?”
“I never knew.”
“But you suspected.”
“Yes.”
Eliza touched her locket.
“Why was my father investigating courthouse records?”
“The missing freight led him somewhere bigger.”
“Where?”
“Mining claims.”
Rowan pulled a folded map from a shelf.
He marked several places.
Buckskin.
Alma.
Fairplay.
Mosquito Gulch.
“There were families who believed they'd lost claims because of unpaid debt. Thomas discovered some debts were impossible.”
“How?”
“Dates were wrong. Signatures belonged to people who were already dead. Numbers had been altered.”
“And Caleb was involved?”
“Thomas thought so.”
Eliza looked toward the door.
“When did my father die?”
“February eighteenth.”
Her breathing stopped.
Caleb had once told her February eighteenth was the luckiest day of his life.
It was why he insisted they marry on that date.
Eliza had thought the sentiment strange.
Now she felt sick.
“What?”
Rowan leaned forward.
“Our wedding anniversary.”
He understood.
“Same date?”
“Yes.”
Neither spoke for several moments.
Eliza rose too quickly.
Pain bent her.
Rowan remained seated, respecting the distance.
“I need air.”
“You need rest.”
“I need air.”
He nodded.
Eliza stepped onto the porch.
The mountains seemed impossibly large.
How could a secret survive eight years in a world this open?
She looked at the locket.
“Mother gave me this after Father died.”
Rowan came to the doorway.
“She said never sell it.”
“Did she explain the symbol?”
“She said the cedar meant endurance. Three stars for family.”
“Thomas told me something similar.”
Eliza turned.
“What exactly?”
“He said, ‘Mercers bend. We don't break.’”
Tears came without warning.
Her father used to say those words.
Not often.
Usually when storms ruined crops belonging to families they knew.
Or when a business failed.
Or when someone buried a child.
Mercers bend.
We don't break.
Eliza covered her mouth.
Rowan looked away.
She appreciated that.
After a moment, she removed the necklace.
“There has to be more.”
She examined the silver casing.
Her mother had given it to her eight years ago.
Eliza had opened it hundreds of times.
Inside were tiny portraits of her parents.
Nothing else.
“The cedar remembers,” she whispered.
Rowan approached.
“May I?”
She handed him the locket.
He studied the engraving.
Then ran his thumb over the cedar.
A faint click sounded.
Both froze.
Rowan pressed again.
The back panel shifted.
Eliza stared.
“I've had that for eight years.”
“Old jewelers liked hidden compartments.”
Using the tip of a small tool, Rowan lifted the panel.
Inside lay a strip of paper folded impossibly small.
Eliza's knees weakened.
Rowan handed it to her.
She unfolded it.
Her mother's handwriting.
E—
If Rowan Creed ever finds you, trust him.
The cedar box is where winter never reaches.
Do not let Caleb Rourke find it.
Eliza stopped reading.
The world tilted.
Rowan took the paper before it fell.
“Caleb.”
“My mother knew him.”
“Yes.”
“She wrote his name.”
“Yes.”
Eliza began pacing.
“Six years.”
Her voice cracked.
“I lived with him for six years.”
Rowan said nothing.
“I married the man my mother warned me about.”
“You didn't know.”
“I should have.”
“How?”
“The watch.”
“You didn't know.”
“The stories about my father bothered him. He always changed the subject.”
“You didn't know.”
“He hated Mercer.”
“Eliza.”
“I should have known.”
Rowan finally stepped forward.
“No.”
She looked at him.
“You don't get to make his crimes into your failure.”
The sentence stopped her.
Rowan's eyes were hard now.
Not with anger at her.
At something larger.
“Men like Caleb depend on that.”
Eliza breathed slowly.
“He made you doubt yourself long before he ever needed you to doubt him.”
Her throat tightened.
Rowan handed back the note.
“Don't do his work for him.”
For the first time in years, Eliza felt anger without shame.
It was almost energizing.
“The cedar box.”
Rowan nodded.
“Where winter never reaches.”
“What place never gets winter?”
“Nowhere in Colorado.”
“Then she meant something else.”
Eliza thought.
A cellar?
An oven?
A greenhouse?
Her childhood home?
Then memory surfaced.
Her mother laughing during Eliza's seventh birthday.
A game.
A hiding place.
The winter room.
Eliza turned sharply.
“The conservatory.”
“What?”
“Our house in Denver had a glass room. Mother kept orange trees there. Father called it ‘the place winter never reaches.’”
“Does the house still belong to your family?”
“No.”
“Who owns it?”
Eliza's excitement disappeared.
“Caleb.”
Rowan went still.
“He bought it?”
“After we married.”
“With what money?”
“I never asked.”
Another memory came.
Caleb insisting on purchasing the abandoned Mercer residence even though Eliza hated returning there.
He claimed it would be foolish to let property sell cheaply.
He rarely visited.
But he kept one room locked.
The old conservatory.
“He has the box,” Eliza whispered.
“Maybe.”
“No. He has searched for it.”
Rowan looked toward the trail.
“That means he may not have found it.”
Hope flickered.
Then another thought.
“If my mother hid evidence there, we need to go to Denver.”
“You can't travel yet.”
“I don't have time to heal.”
“You won't have time for anything if you reopen whatever's happening inside your ribs.”
Eliza hated that he was right.
“When?”
“Two days. Maybe three.”
“Caleb will come back before then.”
“Yes.”
“What do we do?”
Rowan looked at the mountains.
“We make sure when he returns, you're not here.”
Eliza stared.
“Where?”
“Maeve Calder's farm.”
“You trust her?”
“With my life.”
“Why?”
Rowan's expression softened.
“She saved it once.”
Eliza nodded.
“Then tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow.”
That evening, Rowan reinforced the shutters.
Eliza slept poorly.
Shortly before dawn, she heard something outside.
Not horses.
Footsteps.
One set.
Slowly circling the cabin.
Eliza reached for the small knife Rowan had placed beside her bed.
The footsteps stopped beneath the window.
A man's voice whispered from outside.
“Mrs. Rourke.”
Eliza's blood turned cold.
Then a folded note slid through a crack beneath the door.
Rowan appeared from the darkness with his rifle lowered but ready.
He picked up the paper.
Three words had been written in Caleb's hand.
I found Maeve.
Eliza looked at Rowan.
May you like
And both understood that the safe place they planned to reach at sunrise was no longer safe at all.
---
