The Devil You Know Read Online Free PDF Page B

Her voice drifted off.
    â€œYep.”
    Cutter’s laconic response prompted Willa’s rueful smile. “You think you can put that shoe on him without twisting the foot overmuch?”
    â€œSure.” Cutter immediately bent to the task.
    â€œWe are going to move him onto the blanket and carry him to the wagon. We will have to lift him over the side.”
    â€œWhat can I do?” asked Annalea.
    Willa did not have to think about it. “You have the naming of him. Choose carefully. It’s his until he decides it isn’t.”
    Annalea straightened her shoulders and nodded gravely. She crooked a finger at John Henry and he dutifully followed her back to the wagon. She set him on the bed and climbed in, and the pair of them sat beside the stranger for the whole of the journey back. John Henry occasionally sniffed the man’s privates as if they might hold the secret to his identity while Annalea teased out his name in more conventional ways, testing them one by one on the tip of her tongue. By the time they reach the ranch, she had it.
    â€œHe is Augustus Horatio Roundbottom,” she announced when the wagon stopped.
    Cutter asked, “Are you certain?”
    â€œI am. I reckon he won’t cotton to being addressed with any variation of Augustus or the more formal Mr. Roundbottom, and we will have the truth out of him soon enough.”
    Willa’s smile was perfectly serene. She nudged Cutter with her elbow and whispered, “That’s my girl.”

Chapter Two
    Willa directed Annalea to get help, which she once again did by using her lungs, not her feet. Zach came on a loping run, while Happy followed much less steadily, and the newly named Mr. Roundbottom was taken to the bunkhouse to be tended, which involved stripping away his tattered clothes, assessing the extent of his injuries, and then giving him a thorough scouring.
    â€œIs he going to live?” Annalea asked from her position in the open doorway. She stood on tiptoes and craned her neck to see over her sister’s bent shoulder, and when that gave her no view, she ducked her head to try to peek between Willa’s elbow and Cutter’s hip. Cutter stepped sideways, closed the gap, and Annalea’s exasperation was audible.
    Willa’s attention to her task never wavered. “What were you told, Annalea?”
    The thread of impatience in Willa’s voice was not something one could miss; therefore, Annalea was simply ignoring it. “I want to see,” she said stubbornly. “I found him.”
    â€œThat doesn’t make him yours.”
    â€œI named him.”
    Happy set his shoulder against the bunkhouse’s log wall and crossed his arms in front of him. He almost accomplished the stance casually, but at the last moment, he lost his equilibrium and more or less tipped sideways.
    â€œAnnalea,” Willa said. “Escort your pa to the house.”
    â€œBut—”
    â€œGo on. And mind that if he stumbles, you don’t go down with him. I’ve got my hands full.”
    Zach knuckled the underside of his salt-and-pepper chinstubble and looked over at Happy. “How about we finish supper?” He cocked his head toward the door, where Annalea continued to hover. “She can set the table.”
    Willa smiled to herself, appreciative of Zach quietly stepping into the breach.
    Zachary Englewood had been a young man, not much older than Cutter was now, when he came to work for the Pancakes. With his preternatural gift for knowing good horseflesh, he proved his worth to Obadiah early on. When the patriarch died, there was no question in anyone’s mind that he would stay, even though times had turned hard with bad weather and plunging cattle prices. He was a good wrangler, a better than middlin’ cook, and had a steady hand with the horses, but his real value to Willa had always been his ability to manage her father. He was not a peacekeeper or a confidant to