She did not cry until he was out of sight.
"Mr. Josh?" Candace called to him from the barn doorway.
"Over here," he replied from where he was saddling his favorite horse, the Appaloosa he had ridden the day he first found Felicity.
Candace paused at the entrance to the stall and watched him tighten the girth. She waited until he looked up. "Mr. Josh, you be careful now," she said.
For a moment Josh had the disconcerting impression that she was actually wringing her hands in apprehension. But of course, Candace had never been apprehensive in her life. She was only rubbing the bandage on her cut hand. He frowned, wondering briefly if the injury was really more serious than she had claimed. How unlike her to be so careless with broken glass. And how unlike her to caution him to be careful, unless she was teasing. Except she wasn't teasing.
"Candace," he chided her good-naturedly, "I've chased Ortega a dozen times. Are you afraid I'm getting careless in my old age?"
But Candace did not smile at his banter, as he had expected her to. "There's somebody new with him this year. I heard you and Grady talking about him last night."
"So that's why you were sneaking around in the shadows," he tried again.
She still did not smile. "Grady said he's a colored man. You have to look out for him, Joshua," she warned, stepping closer so she could lower her voice.
"Why? Who is he?" he asked, more disturbed by her uncharacteristically furtive manner than by her words.
She hesitated, as if still undecided about what to tell him. "His name is Jeremiah, and he's… he's my son."
"Your son?" Josh echoed incredulously. A thousand questions flooded his mind, but before he could voice any of them, she was speaking again.
"Yes, my son. I had him years before I came here with your parents, back when I belonged to your grandfather. Jeremiah was three when I came here. They wouldn't let me bring him, so I left him with my mother. But he never forgave me for leaving him, and now he wants to take it out on you…" Her voice trailed off as she realized she was only confusing him with her explanations.
"How do you know all this?" he asked after a moment of consideration.
Candace lowered her eyes, unconsciously rubbing her bandaged hand again. "He came to see me the night you got married…"
Suddenly everything fell into place. "Did he do that to your hand?" Josh demanded.
"No! That was an accident," she assured him.
"He was the man Hankins saw in town, wasn't he?" Josh continued, undaunted.
Candace nodded, unwilling to trust her voice.
That explained everything, why Hankins had said the man resembled Candace, why he had been asking about her, why he had not shown himself to anyone else… and why he had seemed so dangerous. "Did he threaten you?" Josh asked gently, instinctively placing a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"No, I don't think he means to do me any harm. He wants to hurt me by hurting you. He thinks…"
"He thinks what?" Josh insisted when she did not continue.
"He thinks that I loved you more than I loved him," she said, her voice an agonized whisper. "Because I stayed here to raise you instead of going back to Virginia when…"
"When my mother left," he finished for her. "My God, the man must be crazy. If he wanted revenge, why did he wait all this time?"
But Candace had no answer. "Just be careful. And Joshua…"
"Yes?" he asked, more disturbed than he wanted to admit at seeing her so upset.
"If you can… unless you have to… don't have his blood on your hands. Turn him over to the law. Please, for my sake," she begged, clutching at his vest.
He nodded, patting her shoulder reassuringly. He had no desire to kill Candace's son, no matter what the man may have threatened. "For your sake," he promised.
"How many of them do you see?" Grady whispered.
Josh squinted into the field glasses and scanned the scene below one last time. "I count six," he said. "Here, you take a look." He passed the glasses to Grady and glanced back over his shoulder. The rest of his men were still out of sight. Good. They had been lucky, he thought, spotting the smoke from the rustlers' branding fire. Now it seemed their luck was holding.
"Six of them and six of us," Grady confirmed. "I only see that one guard."
"Well then, let's back off this ridge before they spot us," Josh said. As he crept back under cover of the brush, he could not seem to erase the memory of that one guard from his mind. Even if he had not known the black man was Candace's son, he would have suspected they were related. They shared the same regal bearing, the same proud carriage. The man called Jeremiah sat his huge bay gelding with an arrogance that even generations of slavery had not been able to breed out of him. He cradled his Winchester rifle with an assurance that said he knew exactly how to use it, too. He would, Josh understood instinctively, be the most dangerous member of the gang.
When Josh and Grady rejoined the rest of their men, Josh quickly gave them a description of the area and the position of the rustlers. "They've got about a hundred head down there, and only one guard that we could see."
"Pretty gutsy, if you ask me," Grady muttered. "That Ortega's slipped his leash for the last time."
"This is our chance to make sure of that," Josh said. "Now, here's the plan."
As the other men rode into position, Josh found himself wondering how Felicity was making out back at the ranch alone. Not that she was really alone, of course. He had left Gus and Cody with her. Between the two of them, and Cookie and Candace, his wife was well protected, or as well protected as common sense, raw courage, and blind devotion could make her. Cookie and Candace would provide the sense while Gus and Cody would supply the rest. Still, in spite of the fact that he himself would soon be riding into a running gun battle, he could not help worrying more for her safety than his own. In one blinding moment of insight, he recalled his father's admonitions about trusting- and loving-other people. For the first time in his life he understood the reason behind it: Human life was simply too fragile. When Josh thought of how easily one careless shot could snuff out Felicity's life, he shuddered.
But no careless shot was going to come near her, he reminded himself, drawing his pistol to check the loads.
Against his will, he remembered the frightened look in her blue eyes when he had strapped the gun on earlier that morning. The memory warmed a place in his heart that had been cold for a long time. Suddenly he was in an almighty hurry to get this little matter settled so he could go home again. Home to his wife.
Josh and his men rode in with guns blazing. Although it was virtually impossible to hit anything when shooting from a galloping horse, they fired to frighten the cattle into a stampede. And stampede they did, right toward the man called Jeremiah. Josh caught a glimpse of the bay gelding rearing in surprise before the action close at hand demanded his attention.
The two Mexicans who had been working the branding fire were running toward their horses, shooting as they went. Josh reined up, taking a bead on the stocky one he identified as Ortega. He felt the gun buck in his hand and saw a crimson stain burst on the bandit's shirt. Above the thunder of the cattle and the roar of gunfire, Josh heard a shrill cry, but the man did not go down. Instead he turned and dashed for the tethered horses.
Grady had run down the other man, knocking him to the ground where he lay either unconscious or dead. Josh was just spurring his horse to go after Ortega when someone shouted, "Mr. Logan, look out!"
Ducking automatically, he felt the whine of the bullet speeding past his ear. Turning, he saw one of the other Mexican bandits careening from his saddle, his rifle clattering to the ground, his chest spouting red from a mortal wound. Beyond him Josh saw one of his men signal that he had scored the hit, and Josh swiftly waved his thanks. When he turned back, Ortega had disappeared.