For me.
He shook his head again.
Harder.
Then he took the notebook.
I never gave your father fifty dollars.
Rosalie stood so suddenly the chair scraped backward.
Gideon could not hear the sound, but he saw the movement.
Her wedding morning returned in fragments.
Her father fastening his coat.
Merrick drinking whiskey before breakfast.
Silas saying, “Rook has paid what you’re worth.”
A leather purse disappearing into his desk.
Fifty dollars.
A signature.
A wagon waiting.
Rosalie had believed Gideon had purchased her.
The entire town probably believed it too.
She pointed at him.
“If you didn’t pay—”
He watched her mouth helplessly.
She forced herself to write.
Why did you marry me?
Gideon looked genuinely bewildered.
Then wounded.
He stood, crossed to the cedar chest again, and removed another folded paper.
He laid it before her.
It was a
letter.
Not from Silas.
From Eleanor Ashford.
Rosalie recognized her mother’s handwriting instantly.
Her knees weakened.
The letter had been written twelve years ago.
One year before Eleanor died.
Gideon watched as Rosalie unfolded it.
Dear Mr.
Rook,
You do not know me well, though I remember you as a boy.
There are matters regarding your injury that I have carried too long in silence.
If anything should happen to me before I can put them right, I pray you will remember my daughter Rosalie.
She is not responsible for the sins of her family.
