Chapter 10 - The Fall of Oak Haven
The wall of water caught Marcus Vance square in the chest, washing him off his feet with the force of a freight train.
His pistol fired wildly into the ceiling, the bullet burying itself harmlessly in the timber beams as he was swept backward down the stairs, tumbling end over end into the subterranean chamber. The freezing torrent crashed over him, pinning his broken leg beneath a heavy oak crate and stripping the revolver from his grip.
"Maya!"
Josephine screamed, leaping through the swirling water and snatching her daughter away from the churning current, pulling the sobbing little girl safely into her arms.
"I've got you, baby, I've got you," Josephine sobbed, pressing Maya's face into her shoulder as Wyatt and Thomas rushed forward to help pull them away from the flooding stairs.
Marcus Vance sputtered and coughed, spitting muddy water as he tried to drag himself up from the flooded floorboards. But before he could even raise his hands, a heavy pair of iron handcuffs clicked tightly around his wrists.
Gideon stood over him, his face expressionless, holding the chain of the manacles.
"You're out of moves, Marcus," Gideon said, hauling the battered enforcer to his feet by his collar and shoving him toward the dry corner of the room.
Three days later, the storm over Bitter Peak finally broke, leaving the mountain bathed in a blinding, crystalline sunlight that reflected brilliantly off miles of untouched snow.
Down in the town of Oak Haven, the morning air was crisp and quiet.
Mayor Clement Reed sat behind his polished oak desk in the town hall, sipping a cup of black coffee and reviewing the morning ledger. Everything was back to normal. The widow Dalton and her brood were safely out of the picture, frozen to death in the mountains by now, and the bank’s financial irregularities were safely buried beneath a mountain of forged paperwork.
Suddenly, the heavy oak doors of the town hall burst open with a resounding crash.
Reed looked up angrily, his mouth opening to shout at the intruder—and froze.
Walking down the center aisle of the town hall was Thomas Dalton.
Beside him walked his wife Josephine, her head held high, flanked by all seven of her children, dressed in warm, brand-new winter coats. Behind them walked Gideon Hayes, leading a horse by the reins across whose back Marcus Vance was tied securely like a sack of grain, his face bruised and his hands cuffed in cold iron.
And trailing behind them, riding two abreast through the town square, were six armed federal marshals from Denver, wearing brass badges that gleamed in the morning sun.
Clement Reed turned deathly pale. He fumbled frantically for the revolver in his desk drawer, but before his fingers could even graze the steel grip, the barrel of a federal marshal's Winchester was pressed firmly against the bridge of his nose.
"Clement Reed," the lead marshal announced loudly enough for the entire town to hear, "you are under arrest for federal bank fraud, corruption, embezzlement, and the attempted murder of Thomas Dalton."
As the cuffs were slapped onto the mayor's wrists and he was dragged out of the town hall in front of a stunned crowd of townspeople, Thomas walked over to the front desk, picked up the original property deed to his cabin, and slid it calmly into his breast pocket.
May you like
He turned, walking back out onto the steps where Josephine and the children were waiting, surrounded by the warmth of a family that nothing in this world could ever tear apart again.
Standing a few paces back, leaning against his massive black horse with his arms crossed over his chest, Gideon Hayes watched them with a quiet, imperceptible smile.
