Sheriff -

The stranger patted his coat. "Somewhere. You want to see them, you come to my office tomorrow. The one I'll be using after you hand over the keys."

Boone took a sip of his sarsaparilla. Set the glass down. "Tell me something, son. You know what a sheriff actually does?" Sheriff

The stranger turned. His star caught the light—brass, not tin, and engraved with the state seal. "Your badge?" He smiled, and it didn't reach his eyes. "I don't see your name on it, old-timer. I see a town that's been sleeping. I'm here to wake it up." The stranger patted his coat

The sheriff looked at her for a long moment. Then he took down his hat from the peg by the door. His fingers, gnarled as oak roots, brushed the brim once, twice, a habit from decades past. "The governor's been dead six years, Mabel." The one I'll be using after you hand over the keys

He saw a man who had already buried his wife. A man who had outlived two deputies and three horses and a son who took after his mother's reckless heart. A man who had nothing left to lose except the one thing he'd never learned to live without: the right to stand between trouble and the people who couldn't stand against it themselves.

"Enforce the law."