Rapture's Gold

by Rosanne Bittner

  Over and over she told herself that he had loved her, that he would not have abandoned her. But he was gone and she had heard nothing from him. He had left Cripple Creek with her gold, and without so much as a glance backward. Despite all the men she had hired to search for Buck Hanner, there had been no word of him, nor had anyone found him dead. He must have gone far away, perhaps to Montana or back to the Dakotas, or maybe down to Texas, where he was originally from. By now he probably had a fine ranch going, thanks to the extra money her gold had brought him. When she had even checked with the local bank, she had been told Buck Hanner had withdrawn all his savings. So, she could only conclude that he had left her to go his own way. He had used her heart and body, had conquered her, and was probably laughing about it right now, while he held some other woman in his arms. She had been a fool.

  The storm raged on, and she continued to stare out at it. Someplace up there men were digging out her mine, bringing down a fortune in gold every week. She was rich, richer than she’d ever dreamed she could be, and the town of Cripple Creek had grown considerably. Its population was now approaching twenty-five thousand. And out of all these people, she and Wade Tillis were the richest. But somehow her riches meant very little. Being wealthy didn’t feel as good as she’d thought it would, yet at the same time she could not get enough money. Somehow she continued to believe that the only relief for her loneliness lay in obtaining even more wealth. She’d show them all! She’d show her parents, Jimmie O’Toole, even Wade Tillis! And if Buck Hanner ever returned he’d regret not staying around to marry her! He could have been the richest man in Colorado!

  Again sweet memories came to her as the top of the Peak was brilliantly lit by the sun which peeked out from behind a cloud. Their special place was up there—the little cabin! She had known so much happiness there, had become a woman there, at the hands of Buck Hanner. It could have been so wonderful, so beautiful. If only she could go back to the way it was, to that sweet, wild winter on the mountain. She wouldn’t even care if the grizzly came back.

  Her eyes teared when she suddenly remembered Amber. Did he still come around looking for food? Had one of the miners shot him? Poor Amber! She wanted to see him again. She remembered wishing he were not so wild so she could have hugged him and cried into his thick fur. Everything was gone. Even Amber. And she doubted that the cabin was still there. Her mining crew had probably torn it down to get to more of the mountain. The thought of it lying in a heap tore at her heart, and her body jerked convulsively. It seemed everything was destroyed, including her own heart and soul. She was just a shell, with a business mind that kept the money flowing. She was apparently unlovable. Why, she would never know. But there was something about her that drove people away.

  Now she didn’t even want friends. What good were they? People could not be trusted. She made no effort to befriend any of the women in town, having no use for the prostitutes and feeling awkward around the wives, who talked of things that did not interest her. Her only interest now was money and obtaining more of it. She already owned a supply store, having bought out Jack Leads, which pleased her greatly. Let Buck Hanner come back. She’d be his boss! She had enlarged the store and had then purchased yet another one located in Colorado Springs, hiring others to manage both stores. Yet she had rented a modest home, for she didn’t spend enough time there to worry about anything fancy. On the hill above her sat a much more elegant home, belonging to Wade Tillis. She contemplated building one to out-do his, but hadn’t had the time to fuss with that. She did, however, keep an eye on her supply store in Cripple Creek, as well as the real estate office she now owned, and she often visited the bank and the assayer’s office, and her attorney to see that things were in order. Now she was contemplating opening her own bank.

  Ironically, it seemed that her only friend was Wade Tillis. Because of their original business deal and his subsequent help in other dealings, they had developed a friendly working relationship. She realized that because of her association with him, others had withdrawn from her, surprised that she had turned to the most notorious man in town for help. But she didn’t care. What she did was her business. Let them talk. Let them shun her. Some local businessmen were cordial to her because they were friends of Tillis. But whether anyone was cordial or not mattered little to her. Wade Tillis had been Buck Hanner’s enemy—all the more reason for her to be Wade Tillis’ friend. And Wade was good to her, patiently teaching her many new things about handling her new wealth and about business. She’d hated him when she’d first come to Cripple Creek, but after all, he was a good businessman, and his original desire for her claim was understandable. Why shouldn’t he try to discourage her? Her determination to keep the claim and her bravery in standing up to him had won his admiration and respect. He didn’t treat her like a stupid little girl now. He treated her as an equal. She suddenly smiled at the realization that Wade Tillis probably considered her a threat to his own wealth.

  That was good! That was power! It was something she’d always wanted. It was her only defense now. No one could hurt her as long as she had wealth and the power it brought. She was totally independent and in control. At eighteen she guessed she must be the youngest independently wealthy woman in the country. How many other eighteen-year-old girls were rich due to their own determination and hard work? She hadn’t inherited it, she’d worked for it. And no one would ever take it from her. Money didn’t desert a person. Money didn’t abandon you. Money could be a friend, the kind of friend on which someone could depend.

  She stared at the mountain as the storm began to taper off. The trouble with money was that it was cold. It couldn’t hold her in its arms. It couldn’t love. It couldn’t make her feel like a woman. Never again would she know the kind of happiness she had known on the mountain. How wonderful it had been to feel loved and to love in return. How sweet it had been to think she could trust in someone. She had given herself to Buck Hanner with such sweet abandon.

  She looked away, turning to go inside. And what had that brought her? Nothing but pain and humiliation. A tiny life lay buried up there, a life she had expelled that lonely night. It had been planted in her womb by Buck Hanner and forced from it by her own hatred and desolation. The depression that had followed the miscarriage had never truly left her. She had built her own little world of wealth, put on her own armor against the hurt of remembering, but deep inside her the depression and pain remained, screaming to get out. But she would not let them surface. She was too proud and stubborn. She would not let Buck Hanner hurt her that way. If she gave in to the hurt, he would have won the final victory. She was through with crying. She had cried her last when she’d wept over her lost baby.

  Buck Hanner tugged at the leg irons that held him, knowing his efforts were futile yet too stubborn and angry to give up. The last several weeks had left him emaciated. Despite having only bread and water to eat, he clung to life, refusing to give in, as he knew Wade Tillis wanted him to do.

  How could he have been so foolish as to ride alone toward Colorado Springs, carrying Harmony’s gold? He should have realized that the assayer would tell Tillis what was going on. Instead he’d left a note with the assayer, telling him to get word to Harmony that he’d be back just as soon as he’d found the best men in Colorado Springs to handle her mine. He hadn’t trusted Wade Tillis to run her claim.

  Now he realized Harmony had never received his message. That was the worst part of all of this. Here he was on a stinking fishing boat on its way to China, where he would probably be sold off like a slave to some sea captain who needed deck hands on his merchant ship. Rich traders often owned ships manned by slave laborers. That way they made even more of a profit on their trade goods. He had guessed that China was where he was headed after he’d listened to the talk of other shanghaied men on the boat. In the meantime, poor Harmony had been left alone on the mountain. He knew what she would think when he never returned, and when she later learned he’d left Cripple Creek with her gold.

&n
bsp; The thought of her being alone and thinking he had deserted her brought him more pain than anything his captors could inflict upon him. Harmony! Sweet, trusting Harmony! If only he could find a way to get to her, to explain. If only he could hold her once more, tell her he loved her and would never deliberately leave her. What Wade Tillis had in mind was obvious. The man had probably already set her against him. He’d probably told her what an undependable drifter Buck Hanner was, and had made her believe Buck had deserted her.

  Buck did not doubt who was behind all of this. He’d gotten only a glimpse of the men who had waylaid him, for they had sneaked into his room in Colorado Springs, and had quickly put a strong-smelling rag over his mouth. Blackness had overcome Buck, but not before he’d seen one of their faces. It was Buffalo’s. He did not doubt they were Tillis’ men, all well paid to keep silent about what they had done, just as the assayer had been paid for giving out information on the gold Buck had brought to Cripple Creek.

  When Buck came to, he’d been chained in a boxcar, amidst hay and cattle, animal droppings all around him. For days he was left there in the smelly darkness, his ankles firmly cuffed, having to relieve himself nearby and share the stinking train car with his own feces and those of the cattle. Soon more men were brought inside, always after dark, all of them unconscious at first. They were chained and gagged. The gags came off only at night, while men stood guard as the prisoners ate. One prisoner dared to call out for help, and immediately his throat was slit.

  “We’ll lay him under the wheels when the train leaves,” one guard muttered. “Nobody will know once he’s in pieces.”

  Buck knew then that he would bide his time before attempting to escape. He’d figured a better time would come, but it had not. He wasn’t even sure where he was then, at some stop on the Kansas Pacific, no doubt. The train had soon left, rumbling on for days while the smelly car got worse and Buck Hanner got weaker from lack of food and water.

  Finally, one night they were moved to a smelly fishing vessel, shoved into the dark hold of the boat, and crammed together. One man tried to resist, and he was severely beaten. Days later they were moved again, to the hold of an even bigger ship, where Buck was now, his stomach lurching as the ship pitched and rolled on great waves. The ocean, no doubt. He’d heard men talking about China. Buck had been around enough to know what that meant. If he lived and managed to get back to Harmony and Colorado, doing so could take months, even years. By then it would be too late to undo the damage that had been done. But few men survived the ordeal he would suffer. Most were deliberately killed once their wasted bodies no longer served their captain well. He received a taste of what was to come when a man came below to begin “training them into submission” to make them “good servants and good shipmen.” Using Buck as his “example,” the man laid Buck’s back open with several cruel lashes, yet Buck refused to cry out, even when they dumped salt water over the cuts.

  The only thing that kept him going was his love for Harmony. He thought of those beautiful months on the side of the mountain, when he’d held her sweet body in his arms and been one with her, teaching her all the glories of man and woman, listening to her whispered words of love, gazing into her provocative green eyes and wrapping his fingers in her golden hair. Harmony! What would become of her? How terribly hurt she would be when he didn’t return! Abandonment had been her biggest fear, and it had taken him so long to win her love and trust.

  Wade Tillis was probably moving in on her now. The thought that the man would probably talk Harmony into marrying him ate at Buck like an acid, making him furious. He couldn’t stand to think of Wade Tillis bedding his Harmony.

  God, how he missed her, needed her, loved her! It was agonizing to picture her waiting alone on the mountain. If only he could hold her, comfort her…But he could only try to live through whatever lay ahead. They had been at sea for weeks, perhaps months. He had lost all track of time, sometimes he was not even sure whether it was day or night. Soon he would be in China. What would happen then, he could only guess. He wondered how he would even have the strength to get to his feet. Perhaps he was already useless, and he would be shot.

  No. He would not give up. He would refuse to die, no matter what they did to him. And he would somehow, someday, make an escape. If he thought about nothing but Harmony, he could do it.

  Harmony opened the door and stepped aside for Wade Tillis to enter. He was more handsome than usual on this night. He wore a dark, expensive suit, and his thick, dark hair was freshly cut. The forty-two-year-old man’s looks belied his age. He bowed low to Harmony, now nineteen. She had been back in Cripple Creek for a year, and she’d blossomed into a shrewd woman, cunning in business dealings and so cold and sure that she seemed much older than she really was. Wade was beginning to wonder if the girl ever smiled, for he couldn’t recall having seen her smile in many months.

  “I’ll get my shawl,” she told him. “Where are we going?”

  He watched the gentle sway of her hips as she walked away from him. He had wanted her since the first day she’d walked into the Mother Lode and demanded what was rightfully hers. Perhaps Buck Hanner had broken her in first, but if she had had a taste of man, perhaps she needed her taste buds reawakened.

  “Well, our burgeoning city has a new playhouse, which is opening tonight. Of course you’re aware of that, since you own half of it.”

  She turned about, her eyes cold. “I’m aware of it. But you might tell me, Wade, why you’re asking me to more than business meetings lately. I don’t mind. I do get a little bored in the evenings, but I’ve never totally trusted your motives for anything.”

  He laughed lightly. “I don’t blame you. Not many people trust a wealthy man. And since you and I are just alike, you have all the more reason not to trust me.”

  “I’m waiting for an answer.”

  He took a hand from behind his back and held out a fistful of wildflowers. “For you.”

  Her eyebrows arched, and a tiny wave of other times and places rippled through her at the gentle look in his eyes. She’d have taken that look for love had it not been bestowed by Wade Tillis. She reached out and took the flowers, watching him suspiciously.

  “I have a proposition for you,” he told her.

  She turned and placed the flowers in a vase. “I’m listening.”

  He straightened his shoulders. “You’re the richest woman in Cripple Creek,” he told her, “and I am the richest man.”

  She folded her arms and stared at him. “So?”

  “So if we pooled our wealth, we’d both be even richer, and neither of us would mind that.”

  She frowned. “Pooled our wealth?”

  He stepped closer, looking down at her as he gently touched her cheek with the back of his hand, bringing back more memories. “A woman needs a man, Harmony. And I’m at an age where I like the idea of having one woman—a wife. Why don’t we get married and stop this little tug of war between us?”

  She reddened slightly and stepped back. “I have no desire to marry you or any man.”

  “Come now, Harmony. You’re lonely as hell, and so am I. We couldn’t be a better match, you and me. Surely you don’t intend to spend the rest of your life without…well, without being a woman again, in the best sense.”

  She snickered. “The best sense?”

  He stepped closer again, this time daring to envelop her in his arms. “You know what I mean. Surely you don’t really want to live out your life alone. Surely you aren’t going to let Buck Hanner do that to you. If you do, he’s won his game, don’t you see?”

  She sighed and shook her head, looking up into his dark eyes. “And I suppose you’re going to lie and say you love me?”

  He grinned. “You’d know it was a lie, just as it would be a lie for you to say you loved me. But we get on well, we’re good friends, and we’d both be much richer.” He rubbed at her neck. “And I wouldn’t be cruel to you, Harmony. I may be a lot of things, but I’m not a man who abuses women. You’d
play the role of Mrs. Wade Tillis well. And who knows? Maybe we’d learn to love each other. In the meantime, we’d be the wealthiest people in these parts. We could travel. Wouldn’t you like that? Maybe see Europe? I’ll take you there if you like. I’ll do whatever you want. I’d only ask…” He swallowed, his eyes glazing with desire. “I want you, Harmony Jones. I admire you. If that’s love, then I do love you. Every woman needs a husband, and I’d not be demanding or cruel.”

  She closed her eyes and rested her head against his chest. He was, after all, a man, and he had been good to her, in spite of his murky reputation. He had not cheated her in any way, and he had become her only friend. The nights had become so unbearably lonely that she wasn’t sure how much longer she could keep going. And what better way was there to forget Buck Hanner than to be in some other man’s arms? What better revenge than to have those arms belong to Wade Tillis? Wade was right about one thing. Buck had awakened the woman in her, and at nineteen years old, she wasn’t certain herself that she could truly go all her life without taking a man again. Buck had made her aware of her womanly needs and of her desire to share her life with someone. She would not let what Buck Hanner had done ruin the rest of her life.

  “I’ll think about it,” she said quietly.

  He drew her closer with one arm while he lifted her chin. She kept her eyes closed, knowing what he would do, afraid of it yet wanting it. His lips met hers gently, hungrily, but she felt no passion, not the kind Buck Hanner had stirred in her soul. Still…

  “Think hard,” he told her. “The waiting will be very difficult for me.”

  She met his eyes again. “I could never put all my faith and trust in you,” she told him coolly. “I learned long ago not to do that with anyone. It would have to be a kind of business arrangement. Certain assets would remain mine alone, but I will share some profits with you because you would be my husband. I would be a wife to you in the best sense, but basically out of duty. I admit I would enjoy companionship and wealth, but there will be no lies between us, Wade Tillis. It would be a marriage of convenience, and for profit.”