Hi, so here we are-back again! Apologies for the delay but with work and needing some personal time to get my head straight I had to take a bit of break. I am back though so please enjoy.

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To Another Heart

Chapter 5-The Strong Survive

Freddie learns about the third missing Cartwright boy.

Contrary to what his father used to tell him Freddie was not stupid. He knew that there was something big and ugly, something under a rock that existed within the Pondarosa and the Cartwright family. It wasn't something that you could speak off but there was an edge here, something that had triggered either one of the brothers, it was hard to tell but Freddie knew it, he knew it in his bones...he knew there was some kind of secret.

The only issue was what.

It wasn't widely known. There wasn't some great conspiracy within the entire state but he knew that there was a gap missing.

He had a night off...and had entrusted his children to Hoss in the process. Hoss had taken to showing them how to brush down the little ponies and how to look after horses and both girls had jumped at the chance. Laura was thrilled to spend more time with animals and Mary had taken to the task well enough for Mary. Being entrusted with an entire library full of books was enough to have his eldest going into transports of delight and more times than not he found her half asleep with the book still in hand from where she had been trying to cram in a few more words when she should have been going to sleep.

Normally he would ride them to school but this was a Sunday and he had it off and quite frankly he wanted it child free. He trusted these people now which was a new thing itself. Freddie was not used to trusting people but he knew that Ben Cartwright and his father were polar opposites and that because of that he felt like he could trust him with his children. Perhaps that was the worst of it...that he trusted this man with his children when he had never done that before.

If the other shoe ever did drop then Freddie was sure that he was going to feel this one...and the whiplash and the backlash were both going to be painful. But here he was and here was his agreed upon course and so they had to carry on.

Or he did anyway.

But he was also a man and while he had loved the mother of his children deeply he also didn't have a lot of time on his hands and so he slipped into the whorehouse and ducked upstairs to find Beth one of the girls that was blonde and bright and bubbly and he slipped her some cash to get the job done. In multiples.

He'd have rather have gone to bed with Julia the woman who owned the place. Julia's Palace was not the most inventive name but she was nice enough to turn him down...apparently you didn't try to out price your own girls.

It was funny the things that you chose to care about. Or other people chose to care about.

It was only after he was done with Beth, taking the edge off that he needed and she had curled up at his side and passed him a cigarette. He wasn't one of those people who left them high and dry for the next customer. He had cash, time and he was in his twenties. Freddie was proud to say he had a short waiting period and so did she.

There was a pause and then.

"Surprised they let you come here, old man Cartwright always has some morality to him."

"What do you mean?"

"He doesn't like us. Julia I mean. Ironic considering he's bedded her half a dozen times"

Freddie snorted and took a smoke. "Can't imagine that" he said truthfully. Beth nodded sitting up when he did and watching him for a second as if to see what he wanted from her. He took a swig of the whiskey she kept by the bed and winced. Julia it seemed got the finest vintage, her girls most certainly did not.

"Well he does" Beth said swinging her legs off the bed and padding to the window naked as the day she was born. She peered out into the street for a second before dropping the blinds. "He's always been coming to see her, you know he's got one hell of a murky past for how upright and uptight he is."

Freddie paused before he took another drag of his smoke.

"Well go on then" he said eyeing her. "You want to tell the story not me"

She rolled her eyes and shifted so her blonde hair was leaning over her back resting against the windowsill her back to the curtain. It was an alluring image but somehow he thought the story that she was going to tell was more interesting than her.

"He's got three sons"

"He has two"

"No right now he has two. He's got three. All by three different woman and believe me he's gone downhill with all three. First...Adam's mother was a naval officers daughter, prim, proper, blue bloodied. Died in childbirth so Julia says and then there's Hoss's mother whose he met on the prairie trail and who is almost as big as Hoss and she went down with an Indian arrow in her back. Then there is Marie"

The name rang in the back of his head for a second and he turned to look at her. She nodded sensing that she had his full attention and he swung his legs onto the bed.

"She's...well...everyone says she was a respectable young lady from New Orleans who grew up the wrong side of the tracks—"

"But you don't believe that?"

"I've got people in New Orleans" she said flatly. "No I know that's not true. Granted she didn't sleep with men for money but she was a saloon girl nonetheless. More like a high profile one, accompany the wealthy tycoon to the opera kind of thing you know. Julia but with a French accident"

Freddie nodded.

"So this Marie...she has some kind of lover I don't know...but she leaves with Ben and has his son, Joe. And then this lover or this fighter or someone that knows both of them tracks them down when they've just moved in to that big house and steals their son"

"What do you mean steal?"

"What did I just tell you. Steal. Broke into the house, beat her and Adam and stole the baby, baby boy Joesph hasn't been seen since."

Freddie swallowed.

"Jesus Christ" he said reverently.

"Yep" she said popping the P. "Of course it was a big thing, Posse and all that but the truth was they never found him. Dead poor little mite but you know how it goes. Anyhow...Old Ben been kinda sad since then...he disappeared for about six months after Marie died Adam was seventeen and he ran the place by himself. Really strained those two...and since then he doesn't really like to talk to anyone or get to know anyone. But Julia...she was here you see back then when it all happened. So he fucks her on a Saturday night and goes to Church on a Sunday and we all pretend that he's respectable"

"He is respectable" Freddie pointed out feeling his hackles rise. "And don't judge a man for how he grieves the mother of his children. Not if you want my cash"

She raised one golden blonde eyebrow and then.

"Well pardon me for living. Truth is Freddie I don't like how the man judges us. But hey ho...there's nothing that can be done, this is a mining town and believe me they'd rather have us here than not. You ever seen the woman like me in a followers camp"

Freddie had indeed. Followers camp was just that, wives bedded down with whores sometimes and some men didn't want nor could they tell the difference. It was certainly not a place he would take his children.

He sighs and then throws the smoke to one side and raises an eyebrow.

Beth smiled.

And so they continued.

He left and stepped into the bright sunlight and—

"Nice visit was it?"

He turned to see Adam Cartwright watching him. He took his cigarette out of his mouth easily.

"It's my day off" he said casually. "And besides...I thought you didn't judge as long as the work got done"

"I don't" Adam said sharply. "I got a date with Sue Ellen myself but that's by the by. You want to do whatever you want to do. Your children are up at the ranch—"

"Don't talk to me about my children Adam" Freddie said flatly. "You have no idea what I have sacrificed for them."

Adam looked at him for a second and Freddie wondered if he wanted to poke him with a stick and see what happened. He didn't care. He really didn't care, his temper was stoked enough just to see where the fight landed.

Adam sighed as if he was too tired to start a fight today.

"Fair enough" he said evenly. "So did they tell you?"

"Tell me what?"

"About us, don't look like that, the girls upstairs gossip more than the soldiers do in the Army barracks trust me. I know that most of them think that Pa is a hypocrite turning up to the meetings about closing them down and turfing them out and then going back to Miss Julia's room and spending the night"

"I heard you had a brother yeah" Freddie said not bothering to beat around the bush. Maybe another man would have done that but he was not another man...he didn't do subterfuge very well and to be fair nine times out ten it showed.

"She tell you what happened to him?"

"Yes...well...as much as she knows"

Adam watched him for a second longer and then.

"It was his birthday the other day, when your daughter came into the house. Pa usually spends it in bed, one day of the year he can't face. He can face anything and everything else but that...it's odd really. He's working on the day that Joe was taken but on his birthday he can't get out of bed and then your daughter comes into the house and he ends up sitting and working with her"

"Mary's a good enough girl. Give her a book and she wouldn't care if the devil was sat next to her she'd carry on reading."

"I know" Adam says and then he stretches in the sunlight like a cat.

"I am sorry about what happened with your brother" Freddie says into the silence. "I...I don't know what I would do if it was one of my girls. I don't think I could get up in the morning."

Adam stares at the painted letters of Miss Julia's Palace and says nothing for a moment and then.

"The worst part is that we can't find the man who did it" he says in a rush. "That's the worst part. If we could find him then we could ask...I mean Joe is dead" he looks at Freddie with something akin to desperation but Freddie keeps his mouth shut. He doesn't know if Adam wants him to agree or disagree but he is not going to draw any conclusions himself.

"I think that's the worst bit" he says finally. "For Pa anyway, the worst bit is not knowing. If we knew...then I think we could grieve properly"

"You think he's dead"

It's not a question and Adam just shrugs in response.

There's a pause and then.

"Do you need me back at the ranch?"

"No" Adam says finally. "It's your day off Freddie. Spend it childfree if that's what you want."

Freddie nods and then...

"What was his name?" he asks. It's an afterthought really he never planned to ask but here he is...asking.

"What was whose name?"

"The man who took him"

Adam's face twists into something dangerous.

"Charles Le Duke" he says almost spitting the name. Then he spits on the floor for good measure. Freddie watches feeling like he is outside his own body. He's frozen in shock feels numb.

Because he knows that name too.

"I hope he rots" Adam says and then he is gone into the Saloon and Freddie just grips the hitch and ride and tries to remember how to breathe before he tells Adam that he knows for a fact that the man he has called father has gone and gone straight to hell, the man Adam has named and that he knows this simply because he was the one who put him there.

And there you are, see you next chapter

Next Chapter-Freddie attempts to deal with the ramifications that his father kidnapped Ben Cartwright's son...and that his father is dead. Hopefully.