Owen
"Daddy, you've got a visitor." Melissa's voice tore him from a stupor, and he jerked his gaze away from the photograph on his desk. His daughter stood in the doorway, in a faded pink dress with her hair piled in a mess on top of her head. Her mother always used to wear her hair like that, and it struck him as odd that he never looked at Melissa and saw his late wife. He only ever saw his daughter.
"Who is it?" he asked. Normally he enjoyed the break to the monotony a visitor offered, but he wasn't in the mood. He was deep in a whirlpool of confusion, with that troubling feeling that the cure to what plagued him, the answer to all his questions, was right on the tip of his tongue. He didn't want to be disturbed while he hovered so close to... what? Absolution? Resolution?
Damnation, more likely...
"It's the reverend," Melissa said, distaste clear in her tone. She'd never liked Peters, and in truth Owen hadn't liked him much either when he first came to town. He still didn't care for the man on a personal level. He had an arrogant way about him that always made Owen feel like a child when they spoke. Nonetheless, he had come to appreciate the guidance the preacher offered. When God head set about punishing him, Reverend Peters had helped him understand why, and helped guard himself against further misfortune. At least he thought he had...
"Send him in," he said absently.
"Are you sure? I could tell him to leave."
"Send him in, Melissa," he ordered, and she gave him a disappointed frown and turned, leaving him alone in his office once more. She was so much like her mother, with that attitude and her chin always tilted up in the air like she didn't even know the meaning of shame or guilt. Yes, Melissa had inherited his wife's stubborn streak, and her wild confidence. Brent had inherited her lust for life and her easy charm. They were so much like her, it should have killed him to look at them, but it didn't. They were his children, and no more. Their resemblance to her was a quiet blessing.
The one who hurt to be around was Josh. His mere presence in a room made Owen sick to his stomach, and seized his heart with grief and loss. He used to think he knew why that was: disappointment, that he'd raised a coward who had hidden himself away while his mother was murdered. Shame, at the walking proof of his own sinful past. He even used to think it was as simple as their coloring. Brent and Melissa were fair and blue-eyed like him. Josh had her dark hair, and her warm brown eyes. It was the eyes that really hurt him.
But really, the worst part about his eldest was that he didn't hate him. He couldn't hate him. Not like he knew he should. Somehow, his bastard had wound up with all the qualities that Owen had loved most about his wife. He carried her quiet, pensive soul-- that feeling he got when he was near her that he stood beside a swift-moving river, glassy and smooth on the surface while all the thoughts in the world ran beneath. He had her kindness and her generosity. He saw that in all his interactions, from the ranch hands to the animals, to Melissa, and now Amelia and Rebecca. Worst of all, he saw it when they were face to face. When he hurled all the venom he could muster and the kid just took it.
Josh made it so difficult for Owen to hate him the way he knew God wanted. Forcing himself to spurn and abuse a person who carried so much of the woman who still, two decades in the grave, carried his heart? It was killing him.
"Owen."
Again, he was jerked from his reverie and he looked up to see the preacher in the doorway. He stood and gestured toward the chair opposite his broad mahogany desk.
"Thank you for coming by," he said, struggling to muster his hospitality. "Would you like a drink?"
"No, no," Peters said, waving a hand dismissively as he settled into the chair. "I came to see how you are faring. I heard there was an incident. Is your son recovering?"
"He is," Owen answered, unable to meet the reverend's gaze. "Melissa thinks he'll have a bit of a limp, but otherwise he'll recover fully with time and rest."
"You haven't sent for the doctor?" Peters asked, frowning. "Honestly, Owen, you put too much faith in that girl. I've told you before, you've indulged her childish fantasies long enough. Have you had any success in finding her a husband?"
A spark of agitation rose in Owen's chest, as it always did when Peters questioned Melissa's intellect and competence. She was an excellent healer. If she was a son he'd have sent her out east to study at a university and become a real doctor. It wasn't even her being a woman that stopped him, really. Not directly. He had no issue with her pursuing her dreams, he just didn't cotton to the idea of her going so far away. She was his baby girl, and he wanted her to stay close where she was safe.
"Melissa's good with doctoring wounds," he said. "She takes care of all the men on the ranch. I trust her."
Perhaps it was all the time he'd spent so buried in thoughts of truth and lies over the past few days, but it suddenly occurred to him that he never hesitated to argue with the preacher when he spoke about Melissa. Clearly, the man was fallible. If he was wrong about one thing, why couldn't he be wrong about another? If Owen believed he was wrong about one thing, why was he so dead set on believing all the other things the reverend said that caused him pain? What made one declaration nonsense and another divine edict?
"Be that as it may, Owen," Peters sighed. "It's not her place. She could be a midwife, perhaps, but--"
"Josh was with him," Owen cut him off, blurting the words at random, like some kind of imbecile. The reverend stopped cold, studying him with slightly narrowed eyes before nodding, his face relaxing into his usual aloof confidence.
"I suspected as much," he said, leaning back and propping an ankle on his opposite knee. "I told you this would happen, Owen. The Lord is doing his best to show you the error of your family's ways. I take it Joshua still hasn't agreed to dissolve the marriage?"
"No," he answered, gaze dropping to the open ledger on his desk. He shut it with a thump and dragged his reluctant gaze up to meet the preacher's. "But I don't think... bears are hardly uncommon in these parts so it's not out of the ordinary. And Brent ran. He's been away too long," he shook his head with genuine embarrassment. "He's forgotten how to exist in the wild. He spooked and ran, and the bear attacked him. If Josh hadn't been there..."
"I take it that's the story Joshua told you?"
"Brent confirmed," Owen said, surprising even himself with the realization. Both boys had told the same story, except Brent's had been a bit slurred and disjointed with fever. "Josh saved his life."
Peters gave a derisive snort and his foot hit the floor with a thump. He leaned forward, steepling his fingers. "I hope I'm not misunderstanding you here, Owen. Are you questioning God's message?"
"No," Owen snapped. Then he hesitated, dropping his gaze. "Maybe," he admitted, wishing he sounded more confident in his assertion. In truth, he was terrified. What if he was wrong? What if he was damning them all with his hubris, his belief that he was somehow better qualified to understand God's plan than this man of the cloth?
"Owen." His name was a warning, dripping with acid. He could not look up, for fear that he would see God's wrath in the man's icy blue eyes. "You are making a mistake that will cost you dearly."
"Maybe you're right," he admitted, studying the whiskey tumbler on his desk. It was half full, and had been since the morning. He'd poured it and never taken a sip, reluctant to muddy his mind while it fought through all the confusion. "But I've been thinking a lot these past few days, and I need to pray on it for a while on my own. If God is really at play, here, I reckon I can find the answer as well in this office as I can in the church."
The reverend stood without ceremony, and although Owen wasn't looking at him he could sense the man's fury. God's fury. It rolled off the younger man in waves of cold that raised the hairs on his arms and the back of his neck. He stalked quietly to the door of the office and turned, and Owen fixed his gaze on the wall to his left.
"You pray in solitude, then," the reverend said, his voice calm and cool. "But do not be surprised when the devil punishes you for your hubris, Owen. And mark my words, God will answer your little prayers with a sign to tell the folly of your ways. Don't forget that I tried to warn you. I tried to save you. The pain that is on your horizon is nobody's fault but your own."
With that he was gone, and Owen thought it was strange that he didn't feel the slightest bit frightened.
He just felt free.