Free Safe from Harm by Kate Serine Page B

pay for their transgressions. No one oppressed the Monroes—not the federal agents who had tried to keep his people from running booze during Prohibition, not truant officers who’d tried to make his father send him to school, not the IRS agent who’d darkened his doorstep to try and force him to pay his taxes a year ago.
    Most of them had been run off and had eventually given up, seeing they were no match for the Monroes. Only the IRS agent had refused to heed Jeb’s warnings. And now that agent of evil was buried fifty miles west of their property in a little patch of woods. But he wouldn’t be so subtle with the Dawsons. He wanted them to know what was coming, to live in fear, to know whose hand delivered final justice.
    Movement in the corner of his eye brought his gaze up briefly, and he saw his only daughter entering the kitchen as quietly as possible so as not to disturb him.
    â€œHow’s your mother?” he asked, startling the girl.
    Sandra set the plate of uneaten food on the countertop and swiped at her eyes quickly before turning to face him. She’d been crying. His baby girl had been crying. He had to clench his jaw to keep from going into a rage at the thought of the pain his son’s death was causing his family. Especially his sweet girl.
    â€œShe hasn’t stopped crying,” Sandra told him, her chin trembling. “And I can’t get her to eat anything.”
    Jeb returned his attention to the knife. “Leave her be for a while,” he advised. “She’ll be alright.”
    The room was so quiet that, for a moment, Jeb thought his daughter had left, but then he heard her cough a little, clearing her throat, and he glanced up to see her chewing her bottom lip.
    â€œWhat is it, Sandra?” he prompted.
    â€œI was just wondering…” she began, pausing for a moment as if considering her words. Finally she continued, “I was just wondering if we’re doing the right thing.”
    Jeb’s hands halted, midswipe. “I beg your pardon?”
    â€œMark tried to kill that lawyer,” Sandra pointed out. “He tried to kill that deputy. What did you think would happen? What did any of you think would happen?”
    Jeb narrowed his eyes at his daughter. “I will thank you to adjust your tone, girl. You don’t speak to me that way. I’d hate to smack the smart mouth off you today of all days, but I will.”
    She shrank into herself a little, dropping her gaze. “I’m sorry, sir. I just…I just don’t want anything to happen to you or the boys. What if you die, too?”
    â€œThen I will die a martyr for freedom,” Jeb told her, having made peace with that fact long ago. “I will not be subjugated by the laws of tyrants, handing over my hard-earned money to them just so they can give it away to everyone else who sticks their hands out, begging for what they didn’t earn. And I will not allow my family to be ruled by the police who enforce an illegal government’s tyrannical laws.”
    â€œYes, sir,” Sandra mumbled.
    â€œWhat’s that?” he snapped. “Didn’t hear you, girl.”
    â€œYes, sir,” she replied, louder this time, visibly trembling in fear. “I was wrong to question you.”
    He turned his attention back to his knife and rubbed his thumb across the edge of the blade, testing the sharpness. It was perfect for tearing the heart out of a deer. Or a pig. And he’d take a great deal of pleasure when he ripped out Mac Dawson’s heart the same way his own heart had been torn from his chest when he’d seen his boy lying on that gurney with a sheet over his face.
    â€œâ€˜Vengeance is mine,’” Jeb quoted, “‘and recompense, for the time when their foot shall slip; for the day of their calamity is at hand…’” He raised his eyes to his daughter, giving her an expectant look, waiting for her to