Chapter 6: Wolfsbane

Ronan turned toward the kitchen before the boot scraped a second time.

"Get under the bed," he said.

"I'm not getting under the bed."

"Mara."

"I'm holding his pulse. I'm staying."

He gave me one look.

Then he stepped through the door and shut it behind him.

I heard Dewitt's voice in the kitchen, friendly and slow.

"Ronan. What a surprise. You're a long way from your fence."

"Where's your pickup, Faulk?"

"Back at my lodge. I don't need it for this."

I pressed my ear to the wood.

Anselm's fingers closed around my wrist.

"Girl," he said. "Girl, listen. I won't have long."

"Mr. Fry, save your breath."

"His mother had the Ridge mill. Eleven acres."

"And Faulk wanted it."

"He sat with her every day that last winter. He brought her tea, and every cup was brown."

"Wolfsbane."

"She signed the deed to him in her sleep. Her hand shaking. I watched him hold the pen."

"Did she know?"

"She knew at the end."

His eyes opened, pale blue and wet.

"She asked for the boy. Over and over. Faulk told the nurses her son had stopped calling."

My throat closed.

In the kitchen something heavy hit the floor.

"Faulk kept a ledger," Anselm whispered. "In the east wing, in the false wall. Every deed. Every pension. He has forty names in it."

"I'll find it."

"They'll kill you."

"They've tried," I said.

The old man smiled, a very small smile, and shut his eyes again.

Outside the door a man grunted, and a table went over.

I got up and opened the door.

Ronan was in the middle of the kitchen with two of Dewitt's men on the floor at his feet, and his shirt was torn.

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