Beth reached up and hugged him, a tear slipped down her cheek. “All this time I thought you were dead. All you did was try to protect me.”
With a sigh, Wesley nodded.
“After that day,” she continued, “I stopped selling eggs to the saloon. It wasn’t worth the hassle or the risk.”
He’d been with her when she went to the saloon and the men had started talking ugly to her and then one had even tried to approach her. Wesley stood up to them and paid a terrible price.
“Who’s the sheriff now?”
“Mark Richardson,” she said. “He’s a decent man.”
“And the county has a lot more money in its coffers now that the fines are going to them instead of in your papa’s pocket,” Jimmy said.
Wesley had never considered that his father was stealing that much.
For the next ten minutes, they discussed the price of the bull. Finally, it was time to leave and Wesley’s heart felt full. He hugged his sister one last time. “We’ll come back to see you again when we’re in town, but it probably won’t be until after winter.”
She grinned. “By that time, we’ll have our child and maybe you and Pearl will be expecting.”
Pearl hugged her. “I hope so. I can’t wait to see you in the spring and meet your little one.”
Anthony helped Pearl into the wagon while Wesley roped the bull around his neck and tied it to the saddle of his horse. For a young’un, the bull seemed docile enough, but he didn’t want him attached to the wagon.
They all waved and headed out the gate and down the road back into town. Wesley followed the wagon with the bull meandering along.
Where he was going, the ladies would all be glad to see him.
When they pulled into town, the atmosphere had changed. It was later in the day and music from the saloon spilled out into the street.
Then Wesley saw him and he pulled his hat lower over his eyes, hoping his father would not see him.
“Son of a bitch, it’s that worthless man who calls himself my son,” the man yelled.
He ran toward Wesley and Anthony pulled the wagon to a halt.
“You owe me a lot of money,” he screamed as he ran at him.
The bull made a warning noise.
“Stay back,” Wesley warned. “Why do I owe you money?”
“Because I had to pay for the damage you did to the saloon.”
“The fight that you left me for dead? The fight I was forced to participate in to save my sister, your daughter? Those men would have carried her upstairs and done unthinkable things to her. And you would not have stopped them.”
“Not if it made me money,” he said, grinning.
His father didn’t like getting into fights. In fact, most of the criminals in town knew that as long as he didn’t witness a crime or have too many complaints, they could get away with just about anything.
“I’m not paying you a dime because you left me for dead out in the street,” he said, knowing how the old man had taken so much money and never shared it with his family. It was stolen money, but they lived such harsh lives because they were penniless.
“She’s your half-sister. It’s time you learned the truth. Your mother was expecting a baby when I married her. You’re not my son. You belonged to your worthless mother,” he screamed.
Relief filled Wesley. People on the sidewalk had stopped and stared at them, but Wesley didn’t care.
“Thank goodness for that,” he said. “Now I understand why you always mistreated me.”
“If I’d had my way, you would not have lived past the night you were born, but your mother threatened to kill me if I touched you.”