by Stacy Finz
He continued to drink his coffee and survey the hole she’d dug. “Let me see the map, Ray.”
She jerked in surprise. “What map? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He didn’t say anything, just stood there, drinking his coffee, watching her dig.
“Seriously, you’re just planning to stand there?”
“Yep, unless you’re willing to admit that you’re looking for the gold.”
The man was insufferable. Logan didn’t even know about the legend. “How’d you figure it out?”
He reached in his pocket and held up his phone. “Google. I saw you digging, wondered why, and did a little research. Most of what I read said the story’s more than likely bullshit.”
Ray didn’t think it was. “How’d you know I was here?” She stood up and leaned on the top of her shovel.
“I was in the neighborhood.”
“The neighborhood, huh?” She stared out into the distance, where a mama deer and her two babies ran across the pasture. Besides being insufferable, he was a lousy liar. “Have you been following me?”
He laughed. “A little high on yourself, aren’t you, Ray?”
She noticed he hadn’t exactly answered the question. “Well, now that you know about the gold, are you at least going to help me find it?”
He put his thermos and cup down on the hood of her truck and examined the pickax. “We have a rehearsal dinner to go to.”
“Not for hours.” She searched for his SUV but didn’t see it. “You hike in?”
“Why here?” He toed the hole she’d been digging. “Why this spot?”
“Just a hunch.” Raylene shrugged her shoulders. She didn’t want to show him the map or let on that she even had one. Just because he was Logan’s best friend didn’t mean she could fully trust him.
“There’s a lot of land here, Ray. You need more than a hunch, unless you’re planning to excavate the entire parcel with heavy machinery.”
She didn’t have the money to do that, and, furthermore, it would look weird to her buyer, like she was trying to destroy something, or cover it up. “Ray said it was here.”
He held her gaze, his brown eyes assessing. “Hmm, was he around in eighteen forty-nine?”
Gabe wasn’t going to make this easy for her, which was all the more reason to dig in her heels. The prospect of money made people greedy. Look at Butch. He and his lawyer had robbed her blind.
“The story’s been passed down from generation to generation. Ray told me about the gold when I was old enough to walk. I would think he’d know, Gabe.”
“Then why didn’t he dig for the treasure himself?”
“It was his own personal savings account. An account he didn’t have to declare to the government.”
He folded his arms over his chest. “Not buying it.”
“Fine! Then run along.” She shooed him away.
He didn’t budge. She picked up the shovel and started digging again. At least before her hands were numb—now they were ice cold. That’s what she got for stopping to chitchat with G.I. Joe. He thumbed through his phone while she worked, which made her grind her teeth in annoyance.
“There’s a hardware store in Graeagle where we can rent a metal detector.”
She gazed up at him over the handle of her shovel. “When we find the gold, I’ll give you a percentage. But don’t get any ideas that we’re equal partners in this.”
“I’m not worried about it.” He tugged off his sunglasses and hooked the earpiece on his breast pocket. “You know why? Because we’re not going to find any gold.”
“Just as long as you know up front: my property, my claim.”
“Aye aye, Captain.”
Fine, let him mock her. What did she care, as long as she was getting a strong back and muscles out of the deal? Her own muscles were on fire.
“Why don’t you get the metal detector while I continue to dig?” No way was she leaving him alone with her gold.
“Not today.” He shook his head. “Today is rehearsal day, tomorrow’s the wedding. We’ll do it on Sunday.”
She didn’t want to wait that long. Dana needed an answer on Moto Entertainment. Raylene feared that putting them off too long could risk losing the sale.
She slipped her cell out of her jacket and looked at the time. “By my calculation, we have more than six hours. What’s the matter, Moretti, you have an appointment for a perm and highlights?”
He came toward her and yanked the shovel out of her hands. For a second she could feel herself cower, waiting for the blow that never came. Instead, he started digging, making three times the progress she had with his long, hard strokes. She watched for a while, because she needed a breather and because…he was something. Strong and efficient. For a second, she wondered what it would be like to have his big hands work her like he was working the ground. Just as quickly, she shut down the image and grabbed the pickax.
She tried to heft the thing high enough to get a good swing, but it was heavy. And awkward. Eventually, he pulled it out of her hand.
“There’s nothing here, Ray. You’re either digging in the wrong place or there’s no gold. I vote for the latter.”
“How can you know that? You’ve barely started.” But her gut told her he was right. She’d been at it for a few hours and wasn’t feeling any cosmic connection with the gold. It didn’t mean she was willing to quit, though. She wanted to study the map again, but not with Gabe peeking over her shoulder.
“I’ve got to pee,” she said.
He stopped digging and nudged his head several yards away, at a tree on the other side of her truck. “Knock yourself out.”
She crawled onto her front seat, found the map, shoved it in her pocket, and pretended to rifle through her purse.
“What are you doing?” he called.
“Looking for a tissue.” She climbed out of the cab and held up a mini pack of Kleenex. “Got it,” she said, and headed for the tree.
It was a towering oak with thick branches, and she had a sudden flash of a past Valentine’s Day. She searched the tree’s trunk, and, sure enough, it was still there. With her finger she traced the heart that Lucky had carved into the bark fifteen years ago with his penknife. Raylene + Lucky.
She shut her eyes for a second and let the memory wash over her. They’d snuck out here on horseback. Ray had forbidden her from seeing him, threatening to fire Cecelia if Raylene didn’t obey.
You stay away from that Mexican trash. He only wants two things from you: a piece of ass and your money. If I ever catch you with him, I’ll send his mama packing and make you and Lucky pay. You don’t want to test me on this, Raylene. You don’t know what I’m capable of. So find yourself an acceptable boy if you know what’s good for you.
That acceptable boy had been Butch, who, as it turned out, only wanted Raylene for her money. Not even a piece of ass, she thought, wryly. He’d gotten that from her best friend and anyone else willing to spread their legs for him. Remarkably, many women had been.
She sat on the ground with her back to Gabe and retrieved the map from her pocket. Flattening out the page with the palm of her hand, she studied it closely, even tried turning it upside down. As far as she knew, Levi hadn’t actually drawn the diagram. It had come from her great-great-grandfather, who knew where Levi buried the gold but was too fearful to dig it up, worried that people were watching the ranch. He died of cholera shortly after Levi was shot to death. The map had remained in the family over generations. Ray had made copies and had stashed them all over the house. Before he went to prison, he made sure Raylene and Butch found every last one of them before the new owner took possession of Rosser Ranch.
“Hey,” Gabe called. “You okay over there?”
She folded up the map and shoved it back into her pocket. “Coming.”
Gabe had taken
off his jacket and stood surveying the hole he’d dug in a waffle-weave Henley that stretched across his chest. He rubbed his forehead against his shoulder to wipe away the sweat.
“This is insane, Ray. Let’s come up with a new plan, like grabbing lunch.”
She couldn’t blame him for wanting to throw in the towel. He was right: it was pretty insane. But she wasn’t giving up. Her father had been a lot of things, but naïve dreamer wasn’t one of them. He’d been a shrewd business man, making a fortune in the cattle industry while other ranchers scraped by. He’d always had an uncanny knack for reading the beef market, knowing when to cull his herd and when to add to it. Besides livestock, he’d profited mightily from real estate, mineral rights, and California oil. All this was to say: he wasn’t the type of guy to believe in a myth.
“But you’ll come back on Sunday, right?”
Gabe wiped his face again, pulled off the boonie hat, and scrubbed his hand through his hair. He stared out over the two hundred acres and let out a breath. “If it’ll keep you out of trouble…and we can go and have lunch.”
Just the mere mention of food made her stomach growl. She’d skipped breakfast to get an early start before Logan and Annie returned home. “Fine. But Sunday we’re renting that metal detector. Make sure the store’s open.”
He flipped out his cell and checked. “Yep. So, can we go now?”
She gathered the pickax off the ground and placed it into the bed of her truck. “As long as it’s not the Ponderosa. I’m getting sick of it.”
“That leaves the Bun Boy.” He grinned.
“There’s a good Mexican place in Clio. What do you say we go there?”
Gabe tossed the shovel next to the pickax. “I’m always game for Mexican. How about we drop your truck off at the farm and I drive?”
She had no problem with that, as it didn’t make sense for them to go in two vehicles. “You’re not afraid to be seen with me?” She smirked. “People around here might start getting the wrong idea. I wouldn’t want to hurt your reputation.”
“Too late for that.” He winked and got into her passenger seat. “Let’s bust a move, I’m hungry.”
“Where’s your SUV again?”
“Down the road about two miles.”
She started the engine and slid him a sideways glance. “You were spying on me, weren’t you?”
“Damn, Ray, you’ve got a suspicious nature.”
She sure the hell did, and for good reason.
Chapter 7
It had only taken Gabe fifteen minutes to figure out what Raylene was up to. He’d been sitting at the corner of Ralston and Pine, waiting for the light to turn green, when she’d zoomed by in her F-150. On a lark, he’d decided to follow her. When she turned up Rock and River Road, it didn’t take much to deduce that she was headed for her property. He almost hadn’t come, figuring she was meeting her real estate agent or her buyers.
But after catching her in a lie the day before, curiosity won out. So he trailed her up the road from a distance, parked his SUV on the shoulder, and humped the rest of the way in. There she’d been, digging in those tight Western jeans and turquoise cowboy boots.
Gold. He suppressed an eye roll. Hell, he liked local lore as much as the next person, and these mountains were full of stories. From the Donner Party to the Western Pacific Railroad, there was no shortage. Cannibalism, hangings, people striking it rich. There was a reason the town was named “Nugget.”
But after all this time—after earthquakes, floods, and fires—that gold, if it had existed, would’ve turned up by now. Raylene was wasting her time.
“What are you thinking about?” She reached over Gabe’s console and poked him in the leg.
“Whether I want a burrito or a chimichanga. How ’bout you?”
“A torta, probably. They make really good ones, at least they used to.”
“How long have you been gone exactly?” He turned down the radio, a station out of Reno. He knew she’d moved back a couple of years ago for just long enough to wreak havoc on the town, then returned to Denver to reconcile with Butch. That sure hadn’t lasted long.
“Off and on, seventeen years.” She was quiet for a while, then said, “I left right after high school.”
“You didn’t miss it?”
She sighed. “Not really.” But there was something in her voice that said she had, maybe just a little bit. “A lot happened and it didn’t feel like my town anymore.”
“Like what?” He pulled off the highway and took the road into Clio, heading for the restaurant.
She turned to look at him. “Stuff with my dad, stuff I don’t talk about.”
“Okay, fair enough.” Gabe was surprised she’d even said that much. Ray was usually a forbidden topic, and Raylene usually answered every question with a sarcastic retort. He’d noticed that about her. The truth was he’d noticed too much about her, including the way those Western jeans of hers had molded to her ass when she was shoveling the dirt.
He parked his truck in the dusty parking lot and went around to get her door. She jumped down before he could help her out.
“I’m starved,” she said, and rushed off ahead of him.
The restaurant was more like a taco stand with a drive-through, an inside walk-up counter, concrete floors, and a few tables covered in oilcloths. Bright Mexican tiles and Day of the Dead skulls adorned the walls, and a big sombrero hung over the door. In the corner was a drink station, offering aguas frescas and horchata in big jars. It reminded him of his Navy days in San Diego.
The owner, who’d been in the kitchen, came up to the front and greeted him. “Hola, amigo. Where’s your friend?”
“He couldn’t come today. This is his sister.” Gabe slung his arm around Raylene, mostly because he knew it would annoy her.
“What does such a beautiful woman want with you, amigo?”
“Ah, Victor, I have many hidden charms.”
Victor leaned back and laughed, then pulled two Coronas from the cooler and handed them to Gabe and Raylene. “It’s on the house. Hasta la vista, amigos.”
He disappeared into the kitchen and the young woman at the counter took their orders. Gabe pulled out a chair for Raylene and they waited for their food.
“The place is empty,” Raylene said. “It didn’t used to be.”
“It’s a little late for lunch, and too early for supper.” When he and Logan came, the place was usually packed. “We’re having steak tonight at the rehearsal dinner. Flynn’s beef.”
Raylene pulled a face. “It’s not as good as Rosser beef used to be, but whatever. So his wife doesn’t have the talk show anymore, huh?”
“Gia now runs the Iris Foundation, a charity that helps women who are down on their luck get back on their feet.”
“I know,” she said. “I read about it.” A former celebrity like Gia got her name splashed all over the tabloids.
“Are she and Flynn buying your land?” It made sense that either they or Clay McCreedy would, since it sat between their two respective ranches.
“Nope.” Raylene got up and poured herself a glass of hibiscus agua fresca and came back to the table.
“If not Flynn, who?” he asked.
“No one from around here.”
Their food was up, and Gabe went to the counter to get it. He handed Raylene her torta and took his burrito. He excused himself to go to the head to wash his hands. Raylene had used one of those wet wipes on the ride over. Even in the teams, he’d been a fanatic hand washer. As a result, he rarely got sick, despite the nasty shit they’d breathed and ate during deployments. When he returned to the table, he noticed Raylene had waited for him to eat. Growing up in the Moretti household, you waited to eat, you went hungry. There were too many of them to stand on ceremony. Their table was like a circus, his sibs and steps all talking at the same time, passing food—a
nd gas—fighting over the last dinner roll or strip of bacon, and joshing each other endlessly. It was the best.
He supposed being an only child, Raylene had had a completely different experience. And there was the fact that her father was an asshole. So, yeah, it wasn’t the Moretti house.
“Dig in,” he told her, and took a big bite of his burrito. “Is it as good as you remember it?”
“Uh-huh,” she said around a mouthful. “Maybe better.”
“I didn’t discover Mexican food until the Navy. At home, it was either Italian, Irish, or some combination of both.”
She nodded, pushing a piece of pork back inside her sandwich. “Logan said you guys were like the Brady Bunch…a blended family.”
“Yep. My real old man ran out on us when I was two and died a year later from a stroke. My ma met Tino Moretti a few years later and that’s all she wrote. Bada bing, soulmates. He adopted me and my baby sister, brought his own brood into the mix, and they had a few of their own. Big Italian family.”
“But you’re Irish?”
“Half and half. Biological dad was Italian. After him, Ma swore off Italian men. Obviously it didn’t stick.”
She dredged a tortilla chip through a bowl of salsa. “You’re still close with everyone?”
“Like glue. We’re spread across the country but that doesn’t stop us from Skyping and texting each other every day.”
“Wow. Nice. I wish Logan and I could’ve been like that growing up. Good ol’ Ray made sure that didn’t happen.” She pushed her sandwich at him. “You can have the rest, I’m full.”
He held her gaze until she blinked and turned away. “You tried to screw him out of his inheritance, Raylene.”
In a voice barely above a whisper she said, “And for that I’m eternally sorry.”
He didn’t know how sorry she was, but she had dropped her suit contesting Logan’s share of Ray’s living trust. In the end, Logan had gotten a nice chunk of change. Logan didn’t hold a grudge against Raylene, so why should Gabe? But the thing was, he did.