Eden Springs Read online

  Eden Springs

  Ada Maria Soto

  Eden Springs © Ada Maria Soto 2012

  First Printing Dreamspinner Press 2012

  * * *

  Second Printing Rookery Publishing 2020

  PO Box 300280

  Albany

  Auckland, New Zealand

  0752

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors’ imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business, establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Cover art by Anna Sikorska

  This book is licensed to the original purchaser only. Duplication via any means is illegal and a violation of International Copyright Law.

  ISBN 978-0-473-50999-6 [Paperback]

  ISBN 978-0-473-51000-8 [Epub]

  ISBN 978-0-473-51001-5 [Kindle]

  ISBN 978-0-473-51002-2 [iBook]

  Contents

  Author Notes

  Warnings

  Eden Springs

  About the Author

  Also by Ada Maria Soto

  Author Notes

  About eight years ago (or fifty in romance writer years) I decided it was time to become a Professional Author. Cooper West was almost certainly to blame for this decision. Not sure how but I’m sure she is. For reasons that are no longer clear I decided to start with a Nerd/Jock!Law Enforcement!Western. I sat down at my horrible night job and in probably not too much time wrote just under 20,000 words then completely chickened out. What if I wrote a Whole Novel and it was REJECTED!!!!!

  Look, 2011 wasn’t a good year for me. I added 64 filler words to bring this up to a perfect 20k then submitted it as a novella. A few people read it, a few people liked it. There were some requests for sequels since it was apparently pretty obvious that this should have been a full novel. I still have ideas for sequels but bigger, meaner, plot bunnies, pushed their way to the front of the line.

  When I got the rights back to Eden Springs I took out the 64 filler words, added a little more poetry here and there, fixed some typos that somehow got missed the first time around and in general just made it a little better. It’s still mostly a time capsule of my head circa 2011, but for an early work I like to think it holds up reasonably well

  Warnings

  There is off page violence towards women and children including sexual and domestic violence. On page discussion of said violence. On page discussion of off page suicide. On page violence between the Good Guys and Bad Guys because Western. And sex.

  Eden Springs

  Aaron tipped up the brim of his hat and squinted into the late-afternoon sun. He could just make out a mess of buildings huddled between a few rugged hills and the mountains. Around him the grasshoppers screamed in the heat and flung themselves into the air. He gave Dancer a nudge to follow the deep wheel ruts winding toward the little mining town, but he didn’t push her for any speed. The day was far too hot for that.

  The shadows had stretched to near breaking, and he could see a thunderhead in the distance. He rode past a couple of pieces of scrap wood nailed together and shoved into the earth. Someone had carved the words “Eden Springs” into them.

  There was nothing impressive about the town before him. Just one more dusty-shithole boomtown, which would dry up and blow away the second the surrounding hills stopped spitting out silver. He could only assume someone was being ironic when they named it. He paid it all little mind, as it could have been the same town he’d left a week earlier.

  He walked Dancer up the main street, which was, surprisingly, cobbled, until he spotted a yellow star, roughly painted on the side of a building and already fading. A man was leaning by the door. His clothes were the same color as the dust in the air and the sun-cracked wood behind him. His body was still as whipcord thin as Aaron remembered.

  “And there went out another horse that was red: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword.”

  Aaron grinned. “I’m long out of the war business, Connor, but it seems you’ve gotten yourself into the law business.”

  Connor nodded. “Yes I have, and it’s damned good to see you.”

  Aaron dismounted and tossed Dancer’s reins over the hitching rail. He had met Mathew Connor in Virginia about halfway through the war. He’d been scouting behind lines when he found a young Lieutenant Connor half dead with fever, huddled next to a bloated cavalry horse. His accent didn’t match his uniform, but he swore he was with the 2nd Massachusetts Cavalry. Aaron had figured Connor would never survive the trip back over the line and was tempted to just leave him, but some better grace prevailed, and he carried Connor to the first Union camp he could find. Connor survived, much to everyone’s surprise, and their paths crossed several more times before the business was done.

  He hadn’t even been completely surprised to get Connor’s telegram. The West seemed to be a good place for men like them, soldiers who no longer had a war, and law was as good a profession as any.

  Connor shook his hand. “I have to say I was looking for you to put in an appearance about a week ago.”

  “Had another job to finish up. Came as fast as I could; might have come faster if your message was a little less vague.”

  “Had to pay by the letter. Come inside and I’ll try to clear things up for you.”

  The office was mercifully cool, and dark, just like a hundred others spread across the territories. A couple of desks, wanted posters, and a few maps filled most of the space, with two iron cages taking up one corner.

  “I’ve got a sick little band of brothers: Elijah, Ascah, and Caleb Buckley.” Connor slapped down three wanted posters. “They got sacked from the mine about six months back for being drunk, lazy, foul-tempered thieves. Instead of leaving town, they stole themselves some horses and started picking off prospectors in the area.”

  Aaron leveled a look at Connor. “You dragged me halfway across the territory to deal with some horse thieves?” He was feeling more than a tad insulted.

  “If they were just horse thieves, I’d leave you in peace.” Connor’s voice held an edge of defeat. “Few months back they got a taste for blood, started killing. They also started grabbing women, then children. The lucky ones are the ones they kill. The rest, well, we got a couple of wives that’ll never lie with their husbands again, and a few young’ins that are never going to grow up quite right.”

  Aaron tasted bile. He’d learned at a young age that men were capable of the most savage acts of depravity, but that didn’t mean he had to accept it. “Well, now you’ve got my attention.”

  “Thought I might.” Connor gestured to the map spread across the table. It showed the town, the mine, and the surrounding hills and mountains, with various small claims and homesteads penciled in. “They’re hiding up in those hills, and I need help, and that’s no exaggeration. This is a wild town to begin with, especially once the sun goes down, but I’ve just got the two deputies, Joseph and Visit. I was never much of a tracker—you know that—and Joseph and Visit were both Navy.” Aaron gave a snort. “Fact is I need to find these men before the lynch mob decides to come after me.”

  “So you thought you’d call in a tracker.”

  “I thought I’d call in the best damn tracker the Union ever had, who still owes me for that night at Fisher’s Hill.”

  Aaron ran his eyes over the map. The hills were rugged, but the area wasn’t so large as to be unmanageable.

  There was the clipped sound of hard shoes on wood board behind him and the sharp clearing of a throat. Connor looked up from the map and rolled his eyes. Aaron turned around. There was a man standi
ng in the doorway. He had black hair pulled back tight with a bit of leather, sharp black eyes, angular features, and was at least a half a head shorter than Aaron. There was something intimidating about him, almost menacing. His clothing was dark, severe, immaculate, and obviously meant for a wealthy city back East, not a mining town in the middle of the territories. In his hand was a fine walking stick, topped with a pewter eagle. The man opened his mouth to speak.

  “Wait,” Connor cut in. “Just wait a second, Professor. Before you start your daily harassment, I’d like you to meet Aaron Byrne—tracker, sharpshooter, scout—and I have called him in especially to deal with the current situation. Aaron, this is our local schoolteacher, Professor Jonah Mann.”

  Aaron watched as he was looked over and silently judged. With an Irish father and a half-Chinese mother, Aaron had gotten used to being judged, but never in his life had he felt so scrutinized with just a quick flick of one pair of dark eyes. He had an urge to stand up straighter. He seemed to pass the initial judgment, however, and the professor gave him a nod. “Mr. Byrne.” He had a clipped English accent that was as startling as the clothes he wore.

  Aaron nodded back. “Professor Mann.”

  “The good professor here has been making it a point to come by daily to question me on our progress.”

  The professor bristled and his hand tightened around the walking stick. “Sheriff, if you feel I am harassing you, I can assure you it is only my little civic-minded attempt to remind you that those things violate children.” There was a cold hiss in that utterance, the likes of which Aaron had never heard from any other schoolteacher of his acquaintance. “We are long past the point where those creatures should have been put down like any other rabid animal.”

  “I couldn’t agree more, which is why we will be heading into the hills at first light to take a serious run at the Buckleys. And this time, I promise you, Professor, we will get them. Hell, I’ll let you string ’em up personally.”

  “Do not for one moment believe I will not take you up on that offer.”

  “I know you will.”

  The professor turned and looked Aaron over again. “And do you feel you are capable to the task, Mr. Byrne?”

  It was Aaron’s turn to bristle. He had more than a bit of a reputation, and it was rare he encountered someone in the business who hadn’t at least heard rumors of him. “I can find a general’s stolen horse in the middle of Texas, and that’s not a boast, it’s a fact.”

  The professor gave a nod like he’d just given the right answer on an exam. “Good.”

  Aaron looked over to Connor. They hadn’t actually made any plans yet. “We’ll start fresh in the morning?”

  “Your horse looked like she could use a rest.”

  Aaron couldn’t argue the point. “That she could.”

  Connor looked around. “Do you mind bedding down here for the night? It’s either here or Miss Eva’s place, and you won’t get a lot of rest there.”

  Aaron eyed up the cell and knew he’d slept in far worse places.

  “I have a spare cot at the schoolhouse.”

  Aaron looked over at the professor, who seemed to have been appeased for the moment. The professor looked back, and this time his look seemed to be one less of judgment and more of appraisal. Aaron tilted his head and did a little appraising in return.

  “There is also a small stable for your horse, and I can provide a warm meal,” the professor added.

  Aaron looked over at Connor, who gave a slight shrug. “That’s right gracious of you, Professor.”

  The professor gave a small nod. “Least I can do. And I will leave you gentlemen to it.” And with another quick nod, Professor Jonah Mann left.

  “That’s your schoolteacher?” Aaron had to ask in case he’d heard wrong. Just the clothes the man wore said wealth, most likely old wealth, that had no business teaching school in the territories.

  Connor covered his eyes. “It’s a long story and I’ll be damned if I know half of it. Just smile and nod when he starts talking.”

  “I’ll try to remember that.” Aaron looked back down at the map. “Now, let’s get tomorrow worked out.”

  The sun had dipped well below the horizon leaving the sky a deep blue by the time Aaron walked Dancer around the back of the schoolhouse. It sat on the far edge of town where the main street turned into just another dirt track. A simple whitewashed building, it was set as far from the bordellos as one could get without being properly out of town.

  Aaron found a small cottage attached to the back, along with a stable and an unusually tall shed. There was even a well pump. The stable had a thin spotted mule that chewed at some hay and paid them no mind.

  Aaron got Dancer settled in, then knocked on the cottage door. The professor opened it. He had stripped off his severe black coat and tie but was still tidy enough to make Aaron quite aware of his own disheveled appearance. “Mr. Byrne, come in, please.”

  Aaron stepped through the door taking in the cottage with a quick glance. His mouth dropped open slightly. It was only two rooms, but it contained more books than he had ever seen in his life. The walls were mostly covered by bookshelves, and the few available bits of wall were layered with star charts. Books and papers were piled high on the one table and few chairs. In one corner there was a stove with a pot of something savory cooking in it, and in the other corner was the longest telescope he’d ever seen. Through an open door he could see a room with a large four-post bed, also surrounded by books.

  “You can put your saddlebags and gear in the other room.”

  Aaron nodded, unable to find words. In the bedroom a cot near the bed was made up with thick blankets and fluffy pillows. The room also had a large bathtub shoved into a book-free corner. A nearly comically large kettle sat atop a second stove. Aaron had to search to find a free scrap of floor to set down his saddlebags and weapons.

  “I’m afraid I’m not much of a cook,” the professor called out from the other room. “But the mothers take turns keeping me in stew and baking.”

  “Anything that isn’t dry rations will be much appreciated, Professor.”

  The professor leaned back a bit so he could look into the bedroom. “Jonah, please. Professor is just for the students and the sheriff. And I am sorry if I seemed a little terse at the office today. I haven’t precisely been myself of late, and the sheriff and I…. Let’s just say it’s complicated.”

  “That’s understandable.” Jonah did seem more relaxed. His accent was even less clipped, more American sounding. The air of menace was gone, even if the propriety remained.

  Jonah cleared some papers from a chair, then ladled up two bowls of stew.

  “This smells wonderful. Thank you.” His stomach demanded he eat half the bowl before even trying to speak again. It tasted of rabbit and possibly squirrel, but with lots of potatoes and a good thick broth. Aaron looked around again. “So I’m going to guess that you’re not an average schoolteacher?”

  Jonah smiled and suddenly looked a good deal younger. “I’m an astronomer. I received my letters from Queen’s College, Oxford. Same as Edmund Halley.”

  Aaron nodded as if that was a perfectly reasonable and expected answer, as opposed to one that created about a thousand more questions in Aaron’s mind, not the least of which was, who is Edmund Halley? “Dare I even ask how a man with letters ends up a schoolteacher in Eden Springs?”

  “That is a very long story, and if you accomplish your objective, I just may tell it to you.”

  Aaron got the feeling that he was being appraised again. He quirked an eyebrow up, which prompted a little quirk of the lips in reply.

  “I will keep that in mind.”

  The stew was finished in companionable silence. Jonah gathered up the bowls, offering, “I have the Pleiades to observe tonight, so I should be out for several hours. There is water in the kettle in the bedroom if you’d like to wash up a bit. The boy from the laundry is also coming around in the morning if you need anything washed. A
nd please take the bed and rest well. I meant what I said—those animals are long past the point of needing to be put down.”

  Aaron woke to the sound of the cottage door opening. It was still dark, but if he had to guess, he’d say it was only a few hours before dawn. He heard Jonah shuffling around in the front room and then slipping into the bedroom. Aaron had taken the cot. After years of sleeping on the ground, he knew he’d have a harder time sleeping on a thick, soft bed.

  There was the strike of a match. Aaron half sat up, squinting at the light.

  “Sorry to wake you,” Jonah whispered. “It’s still two hours until dawn. Go back to sleep.”

  “How were the Pleiades?” Aaron mumbled.

  “Stunning as always.” The match was blown out. “Go back to sleep.”

  Aaron woke (again) to the faint gray of the predawn and Jonah snoring softly. He dressed quickly and silently, gathered up his weapons, and repacked his saddlebags. Since they would be moving quickly, he left his spare clothes and some other gear in a neat stack in a corner of the room, somehow knowing it would be covered in a layer of books when he returned.

  He slipped out the door to find Connor already waiting.

  “So you survived a night in the library? Weren’t crushed to death under a landside of books?”

  “There were a few close calls,” Aaron quipped back.

  “Did you get an earful about Messier Objects? That’s a favorite lecture of the professor’s.”

  “I missed that one.”

  “Well, get a couple drinks into him, and you’ll know more than you ever wanted to.”

  Aaron saddled Dancer while the mule watched with unblinking eyes. Dancer nibbled at his hair a bit. He knew she was getting on and he should think about finding someplace quiet for her, maybe with a family, but they’d gone through war together and then some, and he knew he just wasn’t ready to let her go yet.