“Damn,” Scully muttered, as though he’d never heard of such a thing. “You’re banking pretty heavily on Big John’s better qualities, aren’t you?”

She turned her back to him, so he wouldn’t see the tears of discouragement and worry that had sprung so suddenly to her eyes. “Yes,” she said.

“He’s an honorable man, Eve,” Scully told her quietly. “I reckon he probably wants sons—every rancher does—but you’d never have to worry that he’d mistreat Abigail. He isn’t that sort.”

Evangeline let out a long breath. She kept her back to Scully for the moment and, for the life of her, she couldn’t have spoken.

“I’m planning to ride out after Big John gets back,” Scully told her. The words, and the tone he gave them, made her want to fling herself into his arms and weep on his good shoulder. “I’ll make sure the McCaffreys always know where I am, and if you or Abigail ever need me for any reason, I’ll come back here as quick as I can.”

Evangeline couldn’t bear it, on top of everything else, the thought of Scully leaving forever. She turned to face him at last. “You wouldn’t, either,” she argued, in a whisper. “Men and their promises! You’ll marry and settle down somewhere and we’ll never hear from you again.”

“Would that matter so much?”

“Yes,” Evangeline answered, too quickly. “No. I mean—no. It wouldn’t matter. Not at all.”

“I can understand why you wouldn’t believe in wishes anymore,” Scully said gently. He was lying on his side, propped up on his elbow. “What made you stop believing in promises, though?”

She started slamming stove lids around, getting ready to cook. Scully had cleaned the turkey after he’d shot it—and before getting shot himself—and Evangeline had plucked it that morning, between trudges to the spring. Now she meant to rub it down with salt and butter and put it into the oven to roast. It was almost time for the midday meal, and the fowl would be ready by supper.

“Evangeline?”

She stomped into the pantry, then out again, with the things she needed. “Shouldn’t you rest awhile, Mr. Wainwright?” she countered.

He laughed. “Fact is, I haven’t had this much ‘rest’ since I came down with scarlet fever when I was ten. I could do with some cow-punching and wood-chopping instead. Was it Mott who broke his promises to you?”

He was going to persist until she went mad, a trait that reminded her very much of Abigail.

“No,” she said, throwing the bird’s neck and giblets into a saucepan. “It was my husband. He swore he wouldn’t leave Abigail and me without at least modest resources, but he did. He left everything—everything—to Mott.”

“Maybe the old feller didn’t reckon on dying right away,” Scully suggested. “Most of us don’t.”

Evangeline dashed at her face with the back of one hand. “Maybe he didn’t,” she agreed. “Now, can we please talk about something else? Or, better yet, let’s not talk at all.”