Her eyes filled, though she fought the tears.
“You barely know me.”
“I know you crossed half the country for a chance at a new life,” he replied. “And you brought your mother instead of abandoning her. That tells me what I need to know.”
The silence that followed was no longer uneasy. It was something new—something steady.
In the days that followed, Rebecca brought warmth into the house without changing its bones. She cleaned the windows, organized the pantry, and hung simple curtains sewn from fabric she had carried from Boston. Martha sat by the window on better days, mending shirts and telling stories from back East that made Harrison laugh more than he had in years.
But peace did not erase reality.
One morning, Martha collapsed in the kitchen. Rebecca panicked. Harrison rode hard into town for the doctor. The diagnosis confirmed what they feared—Martha’s heart was failing.
That night, Rebecca sat outside by the corral, tears silent in the dark.
“I brought her here hoping she might live,” she whispered. “What if I only brought her here to die far from home?”
Harrison sat beside her.
