"Aw, Pa, do I have to?"

Lucas raised his eyebrows at his son, warning in his face. "I've got rounds to make in an hour and you have a heap of homework to do before bed."

"I'm not even goin' to school with the rest of the kids… what's waitin' another day gonna do?"

"Put you that much farther behind. When we do get to a place where I can put you in school, I want you to be caught up to where you're supposed to be. Now go get your books from the wagon."

"Yes sir…"

Lucas watched as his son walked out the back door of the office, shaking his head at the child's disdain for learning. He chuckled to himself, remembering having similar arguments with his own parents until he was finally old enough to stay home and work on the farm. The deputy turned back to the files scattered across the desk, his son's scream bringing him to his feet.

"PAAA!"

Lucas ran outside, stopping dead in his tracks as his eyes fell on the gun pointed at his boy's head.

"Not another step or I'll pull this trigger!"

Mark struggled against the woman as her grip tightened around him; tears welling in the child's eyes. "P-Pa…"

"Let the boy go."

"Throw the rifle aside. I don't have anything to lose."

Lucas slowly complied, attempting to control his breathing as his heart continued to race. "Alright… now let him go."

"That's not how this works. You start walking now- back inside."

As Lucas began to turn around, the woman's voice stopped him. "Not like that; you keep facing me. Nice and slow, you start walking backwards through that door."

"Pa," Mark again cried, still fighting against the woman.

"Boy, you stop that or I'm liable to shoot both of you!"

"…Do what she says, Mark."

The three slowly made their way inside, Lucas's eyes never leaving his son.

"Keep going," the woman ordered. "Back into that cell."

Lucas hesitated as he looked around the room for any way out of the situation. But as the woman pulled back the hammer of the gun, he again resigned to her order, finally finding himself locked inside the cell.

"What do you want with us?"

"All you need to worry about is doing as you're told. You'll stay here and you'll stay quiet. You behave like you're supposed to, and there will be instructions waiting for you tomorrow night at the stage stop. You act any sooner than that, and the boy's dead."

"Pa?!" Mark cried, running to the bars that separated him from his father.

"…It's going to be alright, Son." Lucas knelt down as he placed his hands on Mark's shoulders. "Just do what you're told." He looked up at the woman, rage glowing in his eyes. "You harm him in any way-"

"As long as you do what you're told, I won't have any reason to." The woman again grabbed Mark, pulling him away from the cell. "Come along."

"PA!"

Lucas gripped the bars as the woman began dragging his son away. "I'll come, Mark," he promised. "Do what she says… I'll come."

Tears streamed down the child's face as he was pulled out the back door of the office, crying out for Lucas. The woman suddenly stopped, grabbing the boy by the shoulders and shaking him.

"Shut your yap or I'll go back in there and kill your pa!"

Mark stared at the woman, struggling to breathe as his sobs forced him to take short gasps of air.

"Now I really don't want to hurt anyone, but I will if I have to. So you just sit quiet and do as you're told, and everything will be fine."

The child slowly nodded before the woman picked him up and set him on a horse. She mounted up behind him, kicking the horse's flanks as Mark looked back at the jailhouse.

Before long, the town of Benton was nothing but a memory in Mark's mind. He looked around at the dark countryside surrounding him, shuttering at the thought of being left alone out there somewhere.

"…Your name's Mark, isn't it?" the woman asked, interrupting the child's worried thoughts. He quietly sat under the woman's gaze, confused by the change in her tone of voice. "…Look, I'm not really going to hurt anyone. I just had to get out of there without you raising a ruckus."

"Why… why are you taking me away from my pa? I want my pa!"

"I'm sure you do. You just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time… so now you're going to have to stay with me for a while."

"But I don't understand-" Mark suddenly stopped, bits and pieces of what happened at the stage depot again coming back to him. But this time, there was more. This time, he could hear another woman's voice in the background. The child's entire frame tensed as he realized the woman behind him had been there the day Mrs. Moore died. "You… you were there… you… you… you killed her!"

"I didn't kill anyone!" Struggling to maintain control of the horse and fighting child, the woman abruptly stopped the animal and dismounted. She pulled the boy down from the saddle and knelt down in front of him, keeping a firm grip on his shoulders. "I know how scared you must be and how upsetting all this is. I wish I didn't have to take you away from your pa, but right now, that's the way it's got to be. ...In time, when it's safe, you can go back to your pa. Until then, Mark, I promise you that you don't need to be afraid. …Hannah used to be my very best friend. I tried to stop Paul from going back there; I tried to keep him from killing her. But I couldn't. So now it's up to me to clean up this mess and that means you're going to have to be away from your pa for a while. I know you don't like it; I know there's going to be lots you don't understand. But whatever happens, I promise that as long as you do what I say, you're going to be just fine."

Tessa looked into the boy's eyes to see the moonlight glinting off the tears there. She placed her hand under the child's chin, gently lifting it. "…I know you have every reason to be scared of me, but I promise, I'm not going to hurt you."

Mark burst into tears, soon finding himself in the woman's arms. He felt no urge to pull away or run; instead, the child sank deeper into her motherly embrace.

"Shh… it's alright…"

"I w-want my p-pa…"

"I know. Just a few days and this will all be over. I promise, I'll get you back to your pa."

Despite Mark's best efforts to stay awake, the horse's steady trot lulled the boy to sleep long before they reached their destination. Upon arriving at a small shack, Tessa dismounted and carried the sleeping child inside before tucking him into a small cot. She watched the boy for several moments before reluctantly rousing him.

"Mark, look at me. Come on, wake up…"

The boy slowly opened his eyes, squinting as his vision adjusted.

"I have to go for a while, and I may not be here when you wake up in the morning. There will be food and water on the table and…"

"No… no, please!" Mark begged, sitting up. "Please don't leave me alone!"

Tessa gently pushed the child to lay back down. "I have to, for now. Whatever happens, Mark, you cannot leave this shack; do you understand me?"

The child slowly nodded, tears again welling in his eyes. The woman tenderly stroked his messy hair, smiling down at him. "Go back to sleep."

Tessa stayed at the boy's side until his small frame again fell limp. She pulled the blankets over him once more before quietly slipping out of the cabin, her heart aching as she bolted the door from the outside.

It was another two hours before the woman returned to the cabin. The door opened as she dismounted, Paul stepping onto the porch.

"What took you so long? I was getting worried!"

"Things got complicated."

"What do you mean, "complicated?" What happened?!"

"You left a witness, that's what!"

"A witn… well'd you take care of it?!"

"Take care of it?! I was lucky I got out of there alive!"

"What are you talking about? What happened?!"

"What happened is that I was recognized! I should've never gone… now they'll have me on that poster in no time!"

"If they recognized you, how come you weren't on there in the first place?!"

"I don't know! All I know is that unless we get out of here, it'll be a noose for both of us!"

"…They can't hang us if there's no one to say we did it…"

"Are you listening to a WORD I'm saying?! I wasn't even wanted and had to spend all day losing a posse! We go back in there, we're as good as dead!"

"According to you, we're as good as dead, anyway! Who's the witness?"

"No, Paul. We're better off making our way south."

"Who?!"

The two stood staring at each other, waiting for the other to break. Finally, the woman turned and started unsaddling her horse, letting out a sigh of frustration. "Fine! You want to go and get yourself killed, go ahead! See if I care!"

"Oh no!" Paul grabbed the woman's arm, forcing her to face him. "We're in this together, remember? What happens to me happens to you!"

"Let go of me!"

"Or what?"

Tessa stared at the man; finding herself truly afraid of him for the first time in thirty-two years.

"Don't test me, Tess. Don't you dare test me."

"…Alright… you win. We'll take care of the witness."

"Who is it?"

"…Just... just a boy that happened to be at the stage stop."

"A b… could it have been-"

"He's dead, Paul. You need to accept that. …The kid was staying with Hannah while his father was out of town… turns out he's the town deputy. We don't need to worry about him… I already took care of it."