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Page 339
Maybe she could find some common ground between the two warring men. "Thorn, Will tells me that his mother was a dear friend of yours. It must have hurt terribly when she died."
Thorn turned and said woodenly, "She was a fine woman." He reached a hand out to clasp Will's shoulder. "I never meant what happened then. If I could have taken your place" He stopped and inhaled visibly. "I am more sorry, Will, than you will ever know. All these years, I envisioned you undergoing the torture of the damned by the Indians who had captured you. That image, along with finding your mother the way she was . . . " Agony constricted his features, and Will surprisingly, wonderfully, appeared sympathetic.
But only for an instant. "If you cared for her at all, why did you flaunt your interest in other women before her?"
Thorn's strong chin lifted as though he'd been struck. "Our relationship was not such that my courting other women, even if I had, should have mattered. But I did not. And I flaunted nothing." He hesitated, a look of sorrow darkening his features. "Did your mother tell you we were . . . close?"
Mariah could just see a new blanket of guilt hovering about his broad, though drooping shoulders. "No, she didn't," Mariah interjected brightly. "Will just told me he learned about his mother's interest in Thorn from Ainsley."
"Ainsley?" Thorn looked at the uniformed soldier beside him. "What did you know of Mary Porter's feelings?" His voice had a catch, as though he waited for a new blow. "Why did you not tell me?"
Porter again, Mariah thought. Mother of Billy, daughter-in-law of the Porter/Pierce character. Her head swam.
"No matter." Ainsley's voice was gruff, and Mariah stiffened her spine so as not to shudder under his irritated glower.
"Oh, I think it matters a lot." Mariah felt as though she'd stepped onto a slippery bank of mud at the edge of the rushing Ohio. "What else has Ainsley told you, Will, since you came back to the fort?"
Will rubbed his beard in obvious irritation. "As I men-

 
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