Chapter 4 - Mateo's Daughter
Elias and Nia rode toward the northern pasture before sunrise.
The bullet had struck a fence post.
Beside it, Elias found boot prints.
Three men.
Nia crouched beside them.
"They came looking for something."
Elias looked around.
"For what?"
She pointed toward the ground.
"Here."
A shallow depression disturbed the soil.
Elias remembered the map.
The circle.
The cross.
The warning.
DO NOT DIG.
He stepped backward.
"We're not digging."
Nia stood.
"My father did."
"When?"
"Twenty-five years ago."
"Why?"
"Because your father asked him to."
Elias stared at her.
"What happened?"
Nia looked toward the mountains.
"They found an old military supply cache."
Elias frowned.
"That's it?"
"No."
She continued.
"Inside were government records."
"What kind?"
"Land surveys. Payment ledgers. Names."
Elias felt his stomach tighten.
"Names of who?"
"Men who had been secretly purchasing land using false claims."
Elias looked toward his ranch.
"Vane?"
"Not him originally."
"Who?"
Nia hesitated.
"Men connected to the territorial land office."
Elias stared at her.
"You mean my ranch was stolen?"
"Not exactly."
She pointed toward the pasture.
"Your father legally owned this land."
"Then why hide the records?"
"Because the records proved other people had been cheated."
Elias remained silent.
Nia continued.
"My father wanted to expose them."
"And mine stopped him?"
"No."
Nia's eyes hardened.
"Your father wanted to help."
Elias looked surprised.
"Then why didn't he?"
"Because people threatened your family."
Elias remembered his father's paranoia.
The locked doors.
The hidden papers.
The nights he spent staring through windows.
"Who threatened him?"
Nia shook her head.
"My father never told me."
"Then how do you know?"
She reached beneath her clothing.
A leather pouch appeared.
Elias recognized it immediately.
"The map."
Nia nodded.
"My father gave it to me before he died."
"How did he die?"
Her expression became distant.
"He was murdered."
Elias's jaw tightened.
"By Vane?"
"I don't know."
"Then why are you here?"
"Because before he died, he told me something."
"What?"
Nia looked at him.
"He said, 'Find Thomas Carter's son.'"
Elias stared.
"Why?"
"He believed your father kept the final evidence."
Elias remembered the trunk.
The photograph.
The old documents.
"There may be more."
Nia nodded.
"That's why they're afraid."
A distant rider appeared on the ridge.
Nia recognized him.
"Silas Vane."
Elias raised his rifle.
Vane didn't approach.
He simply watched.
Then he turned his horse.
Elias lowered the rifle.
"He could have shot us."
Nia's voice was quiet.
"He doesn't want you dead."
"Why?"
"Because you're the only person who can unlock what your father hid."
Elias looked at the map.
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For the first time, the warning beneath the northern pasture no longer looked like protection.
It looked like a countdown.
