“Adopted?”
Abigail nodded.
“Informally at first.”
She continued.
“I spent years trying to determine where they had gone.”
“Church records were incomplete.”
“The schoolteacher moved several times.”
“I had no money for investigators.”
“No authority to demand files.”
Cole looked at her.
“When did she find her?”
Abigail scanned ahead.
Then stopped.
Her eyes widened.
“Two months ago.”
Cole stared.
Abigail read:
“Her name is now Anna Whitaker.”
Cole whispered:
“Anna.”
“She is fourteen.”
Fourteen.
Exactly.
Emily would have been fourteen.
Cole’s chest hurt.
“She lives outside Laramie, Wyoming, with the woman she believes is her mother.”
Cole stared into nothing.
Abigail read:
“She remembers very little from before the accident.”
“However, she has recurring memories of cattle bells, a black horse, a yellow bedroom, and a father with a scar beneath his left thumb.”
Cole looked at his left hand.
Scar.
Knife injury from his twenties.
His breathing stopped.
Abigail lowered the letter.
“Cole.”
He looked at her.
“She remembers you.”
Something broke.
The feared cattle rancher sank into a chair.
He covered his face.
Nobody moved.
Nobody had ever seen Cole Hayes collapse.
Abigail did not rush toward him immediately.
She let him breathe.
Then she lowered herself carefully beside him.
Not onto the floor.
Her body made that impractical.
She pulled another reinforced chair close.
Cole’s hands remained over his face.
“She’s alive.”
Abigail whispered:
“Maybe.”
Cole looked at her sharply.
She held his gaze.
“My mother believes she is.”
“Don’t say maybe.”
“I have to.”
He stared.
Abigail continued gently:
“We need proof.”
“She has my scar in her memory.”
“I know.”
“She knew those words.”
“I know.”
“The bracelet.”
“I know.”
His voice hardened.
“She’s alive.”
Abigail placed one hand over his.
“I hope she is.”
Cole looked at their hands.
“Why are you being careful?”
“Because if there has been another mistake, I don’t want you destroyed twice.”
He closed his eyes.
That was why he trusted her.
Not because she promised hope.
Because she respected how dangerous hope could be.
Cole looked at the letter.
“There’s an address?”
Abigail nodded.
“Near the bottom.”
He stood instantly.
“Get my horse.”
The foreman moved.
Abigail caught Cole’s sleeve.
“No.”
He turned.
“What?”
“You cannot ride to Wyoming tonight.”
“I can ride wherever I damn well please.”
“It’s raining.”
“I’ve ridden worse.”
“You are not thinking.”
Cole stared.
Abigail did not flinch.
“Cole.”
Her voice softened.
“You have waited ten years.”
His face twisted.
“Exactly.”
“You can wait until morning long enough to bring proof.”
He stopped.
“Proof?”
“The bracelet.”
“The photograph.”
“My mother.”
Cole stared.
Abigail continued.
“If you arrive at a fourteen-year-old girl’s home claiming you’re her father after ten years, you may frighten her.”
That landed.
Cole looked away.
His excitement had erased the child from the equation.
Not his child from ten years ago.
The girl she had become.
Fourteen.
Raised by another woman.
Another name.
Another life.
Cole sat again.