Josiah stopped at the church steps to watch the children playing nearby. The four children were playing tag and from their laughter it was obvious they were having fun. The oldest boy ran over to Josiah with a small paper bag in his hand.

"Mornin' Josiah." The boy's face was flush from playing.

"Good morning Edward."

"Would you like some candy?" Edward held out the sack to Josiah. He could see several pieces of striped penny candy inside. Josiah looked around and noticed that all the children had similar bags.

"Did Mrs. Potter give you kids some candy this morning?"

"Nope, the fancy lady from the saloon gave it to us. She's inside." Edward motioned toward the church. Fancy lady, Josiah pondered the words. He suspected that the boy was referring to Lily. Although he'd heard her profess not to have any patience for children he seen her on more than one occasion giving treats to the children in town. He patted the boy on the shoulder before heading inside.

Josiah closed the door slowly behind him so as not to disturb Lily. She was kneeling at the front of the church, her hands clasped together tightly in front of her. He stayed near the back waiting for her to finish. After several minutes she made the sign of the cross and stood. She sighed loudly and stretched. A coy smile crossed her face as she turned and saw Josiah.

"What a pleasant surprise. It's good to see you this morning Josiah."

"And it's always a pleasure to see you Lily. And alone?" Lily gave him a quizzical look. "Well, Mr. Sullivan never seems to let you out of his sight."

"And now I have a second person trying to keep reign on me. That boy that's working at the saloon, K.C., he actually suggested that he accompany me here because it wasn't safe for a lady to be walking the streets alone." They both laughed.

"I must say I was a little surprised to find you here."

"Why? Am I such a heathen that you wouldn't expect to find me in a church?" Lily's mocking tone made Josiah smile.

"No, it's just that Mr. Sullivan has made remarks before about dislike of the church."

"Well, for one thing, never listen to anything Mr. Sullivan says. Second, it's not that I dislike the church. It's just that I've never found much comfort in religion."

"But today is different?" Josiah could see in her eyes that Lily had something heavy weighing on her soul. She sat in a pew and motioned for him to sit down too.

"Did you know that I was married before?"

"No. But I must admit that I had wondered about it."

"My husband died a few years ago. Today would have been his birthday."

"How did he die?"

"He was very sick." Lily didn't elaborate further for him. "Tell me Josiah, do you think God forgives your sins even if we don't regret them?"

"I suppose it would depend on what the sin was. Is there something that you want to tell me about?"

"No, not today." The pair stood and Lily linked her arm with Josiah's. "But there is something that you can help me with Josiah. I hear Mr. Larabee spends quite a bit of time at a place he's building in the hills outside of town."

* * * * * * * * *

Bryn rummaged around in a drawer behind the bar searching for a pencil and piece of paper. She wanted to start a letter to Tamara in Denver. The sound of loud thump drew her attention to the storage room just to the left of the bar. She drew close to the doorway and peaked around the corner. Terrance was holding K.C. by the collar up against the wall. Bryn guessed the noise she'd heard was Terrance shoving the boy against the wall.

Their voices were low and guarded and she could only pick up the occasional word. But what words she could understand seemed to be about Lily and why K.C. didn't know where she was. She thought it was an odd argument. She didn't like the look in Terrance's eyes. It was an angry menacing look. She didn't know K.C. well but still didn't think it was right for Terrance to treat him this way. Bryn turned and surveyed the saloon. She spotted Ezra and Buck at a table in the corner playing cards. She crossed the room quickly to them.

"Bryn, what's wrong?" Ezra immediately recognized the look of concern on Bryn's face.

"Terrance, he's beatin' up on th' boy K.C." Bryn motioned toward the storage room. Buck started to rise but stopped when the two emerged from the room. K.C. moved off toward the corner of the bar while Terrance took up a position behind the bar.

"Well the boy seems to be okay." Buck shrugged and took a sip of his beer.

"It's unfortunate that our proprietress isn't here. She seems to be the only one who can keep Mr. Sullivan reigned in." Ezra smiled and pulled out a chair for Bryn to join them.

* * * * * * * *

Lily tried to sneak in through the back door of the saloon. She wanted to get upstairs, take a bath, and get into some clean clothes before anyone saw her. Her clothes were covered in dust and she'd found a small tear in her skirt. Her hair had fallen down and cascaded over her shoulders. She didn't like the idea of anyone seeing her looking unkempt. She was almost to the stairs when a hand reached out and clasped her arm roughly. The hand pulled her into storage room.

"Was that necessary Terrance?" Lily rubbed the spot on her arm where he'd grabbed her.

"Where the hell have you been? You've been gone for hours." Lily recognized his tone. His anger had obviously been building for several hours. It would take some careful words on her part to soothe him.

"Oh, cher, you were worried about me? I am terribly touched by your concern." Lily reached out and touched Terrance's arm.

"I'm not in the mood. Where were you?"

"I went out for a ride. It's been so long since I was on a horse." She decided to leave out where exactly she'd gone on the ride. She was in no mood to incur any more of his anger.

"You shouldn't have gone alone. It's not safe."

"That's twice today that a man has told me that being out alone isn't safe."

"Well it's true. Next time I'll go with you." Lily chose not to object knowing that it would do no good.

"All right, cher, next time I'll be sure not to go alone." She kissed him lightly on the check and headed back upstairs to get cleaned up.

* * * * * * * *

Buck stood at the bar watching the patrons of the saloon. Things had been too quiet for him lately. He turned his attention to Lily who was frantically scrounging for something behind the bar. In the past few minutes he'd seen her tearing up drawers and now she was moving every bottle behind the bar.

"Uh, Lily, did you lose something?" She turned and Buck saw a frantic look in her eyes that he'd never seen before.

"Yes, I did. A pair of earrings, very valuable earrings." Lily opened a drawer that she had already checked twice and began searching again. Buck smiled warmly at Bryn as she came up to the bar.

"Lily, may I talk t' ya for a minute?"

"Can it wait, Bryn?"

"Well . . ." Bryn wanted to talk to Lily while Terrance was busy with a poker game. Lily looked up at Bryn's hesitancy. She gave the younger woman a smile and sighed.

"All right, cher, what is it?" Bryn leaned in and kept her voice low. Buck moved away to give them a little privacy.

"Maybe it's no' my place t' say anythin' but earlier I saw Mr. Sullivan yellin' at K.C. and I think he might have been beating up on him. Mr. Sullivan was yellin' at him for something, though I couldn't really tell what it was." Bryn watched as Lily's glance traveled around the room finding both Terrance and K.C.

"I'll look into it. Thank you for telling me." Lily gave Bryn's hand a gently squeeze. Neither one had noticed that Terrance had suddenly appeared on the other side of Lily.

"Are you two up to something?" Terrance tried to keep his tone light.

"Always, cher, always." Lily chuckled and went back to searching through a drawer. Bryn headed toward the piano to get prepared to perform.

"Lily, darling, have you lost something?" Terrance watched Bryn out of the corner of his eye. What were they discussing, he wondered in his head.

"Yes, my earrings. I had them earlier and now they're gone."

"Where you wearing them earlier?"

"I think so. Maybe not. Either way, they're gone now."

"Well, if you weren't wearing them earlier, maybe you didn't lose them."

"What are you saying?"

"Maybe they were stolen."

"Stolen? That's absurd. Who would do that?" Lily followed Terrance's gaze to Bryn, who had just begun singing. Her melodic tones wafted through the room. "That's ridiculous. Don't even suggest that."

"All I'm saying is--" Lily threw up her hand halting Terrance from going any further.

"I don't even want to hear it." Terrance watched as a flush crept over Lily's face as Chris Larabee approached the bar. She moved away from Terrance to where Chris had taken up a position at the end of the bar. He wondered what Lily was talking so animatedly about with Chris.

Terrance moved out from behind the bar quickly and headed for the door. He found K.C. sitting near the door. He leaned down and whispered in the his ear. "I'm going to take care of some business. Keep an eye on things, especially them." He pointed toward the pair at the end of the bar.