Kady put the envelope on her lap and looked up at the man across from her. “Don’t you need some identification to make sure I’m who I say I am?”
Smiling at her, he pulled a sheaf of papers from a fat leather case on the floor beside the table and handed the papers to her. Kady saw that the yellowed sheets were covered with pen-and-ink sketches of her and Ruth, all scenes from the afternoon and night they had spent together. They were shown walking together, talking, laughing, sitting in the shade at the picnic, in chairs on the porch.
“The other woman is Ruth Jordan?” the lawyer asked softly, seeing the way Kady so tenderly touched the papers with her fingertips.
“Yes,” Kady whispered as she saw the name Joseph written at the bottom, the name of Ruth’s uncomplaining servant who had served them and waited while they talked. How much had he heard that night?
“She certainly looks different from the image in ‘A Town Destroyed by Hatred,’ doesn’t she?”
“She was lovely, truly lovely,” was all Kady could manage to say, and when Mr. Fowler leaned back in his chair with a self-satisfied look on his face, she knew she had said too much. It was easy to see that he had wanted to know if Kady had somehow actually met Ruth Jordan and now he did know.
“Excuse me,” he said, rising. “I think you should read the letter from Ruth in private. When you have finished, just push that button on the table beside you and I’ll return. I will be waiting for you.” With that he left Kady alone in the room.
For a moment she hesitated before opening the yellowed envelope, for she knew that what was inside would once again involve her in the Jordan family and Legend, Colorado. Part of her wanted to throw the letter down and go back to her hotel room and start finding a new job. But the larger part of her was haunted by the eyes of C. T. Jordan.
Quickly, before she changed her mind, she used the silver letter opener Mr. Fowler had so thoughtfully provided and slit the envelope open.
My dearest Kady,
If you are reading this now, then I know you have tried and succeeded in finding my descendants. I gave you a time limit to persuade myself of your interest. If you had put off your search for longer than six weeks, then I would have known there was no hope that you’d have the love and passion that you were going to need to help us. I felt that six weeks was long enough for you to realize that you couldn’t be in love with your Gregory. If you were, you wouldn’t have been sent to us.
If you are reading this and you have contacted my family within the time limit, then you now have absolute control of all my family’s wealth.
At this Kady drew in her breath. But no, what she was reading couldn’t be correct. She looked back at the letter.
Perhaps I have left you nothing. For all I know, ninety-eight years from now my family is poor, but, if my descendants are anything like my son Cole Tarik, I somehow doubt it. It is my guess that at this moment you are a very rich young woman.
So why have I given you so much and trusted you so completely? Kady, you can solve this. You can right a horrible wrong, not only what happened to my family but to all the inhabitants of Legend. Because of what happened in that fateful week when my family was murdered, hundreds of people suffered for generations.
I don’t know how you can do what I’m asking of you or even if it can be done, but I beg of you to try. The people you met in Legend never had a chance to live. They never had a chance to grow up, to have children of their own, to grow old.
We made the mistakes, Kady, not you. You have been a pawn in all this, but your kindness and generosity were so great that you were able to raise the dead. For a while you gave us hope; you gave us life.
And now I am asking that you figure out a way to do it again. I have done what I could to help you. I have given you the power that money gives to people; I have disinherited my own kin in favor of you, a woman I spent mere hours with. But I trust you because you were chosen to come back to us. You can use the money for whatever purposes you want; it is yours without any strings attached. Build yourself a mansion, buy a dozen car riages dripping gold, I have given you that right.
But I cannot see you doing such a thing. Please, I beg of you, please, Kady, help us. We need you. All of us need you so very much.
Yours with love and hope,
Ruth Jordan
When Kady put down the letter, she felt as though the breath had been knocked out of her. “For a while you gave us hope; you gave us life,” she reread. “Your kindness and generosity.” Those were almost the very words that Jane had used.
How? she thought. How could she accomplish what Ruth asked of her? Her head was reeling so fast that she could think of nothing, could formulate no plan. She pushed the button on the table, and instantly, Mr. Fowler reappeared.
When he was seated, Kady held up Ruth’s letter. “Does C. T. Jordan know of this?” she asked.
“Know of what?” he asked, his eyes twinkling, but it was a lawyer’s non-answer in an attempt to find out exactly how much she knew.
“Does he know that since he saw me yesterday, now everything is mine?”
Mr. Fowler smiled at her. “Yes, he knows.”
No wonder he refused to see me, she thought. And that’s why he’d refused to allow her to be thrown out of the office. After all, from the moment she walked in the front door, she was the owner of the building.
Her mind was tumbling over itself with a thousand thoughts. What am I to do now? was the one on top.
Tarik must help me, she thought, and immediately it struck her odd that she would call him that, as everyone else referred to him as C. T.—or, actually, as Mr. Jordan. Maybe it was because she’d heard the name so often from Cole or maybe it was because she’d spent a lifetime of seeing C. T. Jordan in Arabian dress that the Arabian-sounding name suited him.