Chapter 15 - A Midnight Ride to Bitter Creek
Josephine could not move.
Thomas looked older than thirty-five.
His cheeks were hollow.
A scar crossed his chin.
His coat was too thin for Wyoming.
But he was alive.
That fact overwhelmed everything else.
"You left."
The words came out sharper than Josephine intended.
Thomas lowered his eyes.
"I know."
"Mother died."
His face tightened.
"I know."
"You didn't come back."
"I couldn't."
"You could have written."
"I did."
Josephine stared.
"No."
"Three times."
"I never got anything."
Thomas looked confused.
Then ashamed.
"I sent letters to the Omaha rooming house."
"I left."
He nodded slowly.
Lucien stepped backward.
"I'll give you privacy."
Josephine caught his hand.
"No."
She surprised herself.
Thomas noticed.
Josephine released Lucien and looked at her brother.
"Why are you here?"
Thomas sat.
"Because I saw your name."
"Where?"
"Denver newspaper."
Ironwood Provisions.
Josephine had become part of trade advertisements.
Thomas continued.
"I wasn't sure it was you until someone mentioned the red-haired Mrs. Hatcher from Omaha."
Josephine folded her arms.
"Four years."
"I know."
"You keep saying that."
Thomas's voice cracked.
"What do you want me to say?"
"The truth."
So he told her.
After the meat shop collapsed, Thomas had owed more than Josephine knew.
Not only bank debt.
Supplier obligations.
Private notes.
One creditor threatened criminal accusations over inventory financing.
Thomas panicked.
He believed if he stayed, authorities might seize their mother's home too.
So he left.
Cowardly.
Desperate.
Ashamed.
"I thought if I disappeared, they'd stop coming after you."
Josephine laughed bitterly.
"They didn't."
"I know that now."
She looked away.
Thomas continued.
"I went south. Worked rail crews. Packing houses. Stockyards. Every time I thought about writing, it had been too long."
"That's a poor excuse."
"Yes."
Lucien watched without interfering.
Then Thomas said something unexpected.
"I know Gideon Crowe."
Josephine turned.
"What?"
"Not personally."
He reached into his coat.
"I worked for a packing company in Denver. Crowe approached them last year about buying preserved beef."
Lucien stepped closer.
"So?"
"He talked about Ironwood."
Josephine's pulse accelerated.
"What did he say?"
"That he'd soon control the best water ranch in the basin."
Thomas placed folded correspondence on the table.
"I handled invoices. Crowe left copies."
Josephine opened them.
Letters between Crowe and a Denver investment syndicate.
They discussed selling Ironwood's water rights once acquired.
Vale's ledger showed motive.
These letters showed planned profit.
More evidence.
"Why keep them?" Lucien asked.
Thomas looked embarrassed.
"Because I recognized the pattern."
Josephine understood before he explained.
"Like our shop."
Thomas nodded.
"The man who financed me."
"What about him?"
"He worked with Vale."
Josephine sat.
For years she had blamed Thomas.
But the same network had perhaps preyed on their family.
Thomas continued.
"I was stupid, Josie. I signed bad agreements. Nobody forced me."
Josephine's anger softened, but did not disappear.
"But they knew exactly what they were doing."
"Yes."
Lucien looked at the documents.
"Bellamy needs these."
Thomas nodded.
"That's why I came."
A shout sounded outside.
Then a horse galloped through the yard.
Jeb entered.
"Crowe's been seen."
"Where?" Lucien asked.
"South ridge."
Bellamy's deputy had ridden from Bitter Creek.
Crowe had apparently headed toward Ironwood.
Why?
No one knew.
Josephine looked at Thomas.
"You need to leave."
He shook his head.
"I just arrived."
"Crowe might know you have those letters."
"He doesn't."
"You don't know that."
Lucien agreed.
"We take the documents to Bellamy tonight."
Josephine looked outside.
Dark.
Snow.
"No."
Lucien raised an eyebrow.
She smiled slightly.
"You taught me something."
"What?"
"Sometimes riding at night is stupid."
Jeb laughed.
Lucien looked proud.
Then Thomas spoke.
"There's another reason Crowe may come here."
Everyone turned.
Thomas unfolded one letter.
A survey map.
Ironwood's south creek.
A marked location near the narrows.
"What is this?" Josephine asked.
Lucien's face changed.
"Dam site."
Crowe's investors intended eventually to divert part of the creek toward mining operations.
If he couldn't own Ironwood, he could not control the water.
Thomas pointed toward a handwritten note.
Existing diversion structure must be secured or rendered unusable before spring runoff.
Lucien stared.
"The old diversion gate."
Ironwood had an obsolete timber control gate upstream, built decades earlier.
Rarely used.
But if damaged during heavy runoff, debris could block the narrow channel and flood pasture.
Josephine felt cold.
"Final sabotage."
Lucien grabbed his coat.
This time she didn't stop him.
They rode south with Jeb, Billy, and four others.
Josephine came too.
Lucien protested.
She ignored him.
Moonlight reflected off snow.
At the creek narrows, they found tracks.
Fresh.
Two horses.
Then the smell.
Kerosene.
Again.
Lucien dismounted.
Someone had stacked dry timber against the old gate.
If burned, weakened supports could collapse into the channel when spring water rose.
Crowe didn't need to own Ironwood anymore.
He could damage its most valuable resource.
A figure moved above them.
"Crowe!"
Lucien shouted.
The man ran.
No guns were fired.
No dramatic fight.
Crowe knew he was outnumbered.
He mounted a horse hidden among the trees.
Lucien chased.
Josephine shouted after him.
"Don't!"
But Lucien was already riding.
Crowe disappeared through the pines.
Lucien followed.
Josephine hated waiting.
Minutes stretched.
Then a horse returned.
Lucien.
Alone.
"Lost him."
"Good."
He frowned.
"Good?"
"You came back."
He understood.
They dismantled the stacked timber.
Removed the oil.
Secured the gate.
Near dawn, Sheriff Bellamy arrived with deputies.
Thomas gave him the letters.
By sunrise, warrants expanded across three counties.
Crowe's escape routes narrowed.
The fight was no longer private.
It belonged to the law.
Back at Ironwood, Josephine sat with Thomas.
The first sunlight touched the mountain.
"I don't know if I forgive you," she said.
Thomas nodded.
"I didn't ask."
"I might someday."
"I can wait."
Josephine smiled sadly.
"You're good at that."
He laughed.
Then she hugged him.
Not because everything was repaired.
It wasn't.
But because some things didn't need to be finished before they could begin healing.
Lucien watched from a distance.
Later Josephine joined him near the corral.
"You were right."
He looked worried.
"About?"
"Finding him."
Lucien smiled.
She leaned against him.
For a moment, Ironwood was quiet.
Then Bellamy rode back into the yard.
Josephine frowned.
"You just left."
"I know."
"What's wrong?"
Bellamy dismounted.
"Crowe surrendered."
Everyone stared.
"Why?" Lucien asked.
Bellamy's expression was strange.
"He didn't surrender to me."
"Then who?"
"First Territorial Bank."
Josephine felt unease.
Bellamy continued.
"Crowe claims Ironwood still belongs to him through the note option. He's filed for an emergency territorial hearing."
Lucien cursed.
"He knows he'll lose criminally."
"Probably."
"So what's he doing?"
Bellamy looked toward the ranch.
"Trying one last time to take this place legally before a judge decides whether to put him behind bars."
The hearing was scheduled in two days.
All the sabotage evidence mattered.
But the central legal question was brutally simple.
Who owned Lucien's debt at nine o'clock on January twenty-eighth?
And if a judge ruled Crowe's transfer occurred before Ironwood's payment—
May you like
the ranch Josephine had just saved could still be taken from them on a technicality.
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