Water.
Barn.
Animals.
Compresses.
Pain tea.
Judson hated dependence.
She enjoyed that more than was charitable.
“Stay down.”
“I need to check the horses.”
“I did.”
“Water?”
“Done.”
“Wood?”
“Stacked.”
“Roof?”
“Still attached.”
Judson frowned.
“You sound pleased.”
“I am.”
“Why?”
“You cannot order me around from bed.”
He looked at her.
“Josie.”
“Yes?”
“Come closer.”
“No.”
“Coward.”
She laughed.
“Your tricks fail when horizontal.”
He healed slowly.
The forced stillness opened the iron box.
Not literally at first.
Emotionally.
One night Judson could not sleep.
Josie sat near the fire.
He spoke.
“My wife was named Anna.”
Josie became still.
“You were married.”
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“Four years.”
“What happened?”
Judson stared at the flames.
“She died.”
Josie waited.
“During winter?”
“Yes.”
“Childbirth?”
“No.”
His jaw tightened.
“A man killed her.”
The room changed.
Josie’s breath slowed.
“The story.”
Judson looked at her.
“What story?”
“Cheyenne.”
“Men you killed.”
His eyes lowered.
“Some of it is true.”
“How much?”
“Enough.”
Josie sat opposite him.
Judson continued.
Anna had been attacked while traveling with her younger brother.
Three men.
Robbery first.
Then worse.
Her brother escaped.
Judson tracked them.
One surrendered to a sheriff.
Two did not.
“What did you do?”
Josie asked.
Judson’s face became stone.
“What you heard.”
“Killed them?”
“Yes.”
Her stomach tightened.
Judson saw it.
“I told you there are things about me you may not like.”
“Were they armed?”
“Yes.”
“Did they attack you?”
“One did.”
“And the other?”
Silence.
There.
The part that haunted him.
Judson looked toward the iron box.
“I could have brought him in.”
“But?”
“I didn't.”
Josie said nothing.
Judson continued.
“I wanted him afraid.”
“I wanted him to know why.”
“And afterward?”
“Nothing changed.”
His voice broke slightly.
“Anna remained dead.”
He looked at his hands.
“I became the man everyone now whispers about.”
Josie understood suddenly.
His restraint.
The constant asking.
The refusal to treat ownership as permission.
“What happened to Anna?”
he continued.
“She had spent years being controlled by her father.”
“Then a husband before me.”
“A bad one.”
“She divorced him.”
“Scandal.”
“When she came west, people treated her like property already damaged by someone else.”
Josie’s throat tightened.