“Forgot salt.”
“You did.”
“Found you.”
Her tears fell.
“I love you.”
He whispered:
“I know.”
“Arrogant.”
“Yes.”
Then:
“Love you too.”
He died before dawn.
Lara hated everyone who told her he was at peace.
Maybe he was.
She was not.
She spent the next year learning widowhood again.
Different.
Harder in some ways because this marriage had lasted nearly four decades.
Mateo remained part of her.
Elias joined him.
Not replacing.
Accumulating.
A life could contain more than one great love without making either less real.
Lara lived another nine years.
She became terrifyingly old, according to Anna’s children.
She still inspected ledgers.
Still complained about waste.
Still insisted every room at the freight station have strong armless chairs in several widths.
In 1930, at seventy-five, she asked Anna to bring her to Deadwood one final time.
The train platform had changed.
Newer building.
Automobiles in street.
Electric lights.
But enough remained.
Anna pushed Lara’s chair toward the place where she believed the old platform had been.
Lara held the gold locket Elias gave her.
Inside now were three tiny photographs.
Her mother.
Mateo.
Elias.
Anna asked:
“What are you thinking?”
Lara smiled.
“That your father was handsome.”
Anna laughed.
“You mean Elias?”
“Yes.”
“You never called him my father before.”
Lara looked toward her.
“He was.”
Anna’s eyes filled.
Lara continued:
“And Mateo would have liked him.”
“You think?”
“No.”
“Mateo hated ranchers.”
Anna laughed.
Lara looked toward street.
Long ago, men stood there laughing.
Caleb raised whiskey.
Thomas waited in Boston.
A forged contract sat in her hand.
She had believed herself delivered.
A parcel.
A burden.
A joke.
Then a rancher tore the paper.
Not because he loved her.
He did not know her.
That mattered.
Kindness before love mattered differently.
He did not help because she became valuable to him.
He helped because leaving someone to freeze was wrong.
Love came afterward.
Slowly.
Messily.
Freely.
Lara touched the locket.
“Anna.”
“Yes?”
“Promise me something.”
“What?”
“When people tell this story after I’m gone…”
“What story?”
“You know.”
“The fake bride.”
“The forged contract.”
“Elias.”
Anna smiled.
“I know.”
“Don't say he saved me.”
Anna looked at her.
“What should I say?”
Lara thought.
Then smiled.
“Say he believed me before he loved me.”
Anna waited.
Lara continued:
“Say I believed myself eventually.”
“That’s the important part.”
Anna nodded.
“I promise.”
Lara looked toward the railway.
A train whistle sounded in distance.
For one strange second, she was twenty-eight again.
Cold.
Ashamed.
Standing beside a trunk too heavy for one man.
Waiting for another humiliation.
Then she remembered what Elias had said.
No contract owns you.
Come somewhere safe tonight.
Tomorrow, you decide.
Tomorrow.
That had been his gift.
Not marriage.
Not ranch.
Not money.
Tomorrow.
A day that belonged to her.
Lara closed her eyes.
Smiled.
And listened to the train arrive.