Leo nodded, but the frown still sat between his brows. “What if the gold is in a safe?”
Cilla’s eyes darted between Leo and Brynne.
“I’ve got it covered.”
“How?” Brynne insisted.
Cilla huffed and walked to her saddlebag, which was leaning against the wall by the front door. She’d been hoping to keep this part to herself until absolutely necessary, but here went nothing. She reached in and pulled out two sticks of dynamite.
“Priscilla Marie Richardson, where in the name of all that is holy did you get that?”
Brynne looked like she wanted to rip it from Cilla’s hands but was too afraid to touch it.
Cilla sighed. “I knew you’d overreact.”
“What?”
“It doesn’t matter where I got it. Point is, I have it if we need it. If the safe is small enough, we carry it off and deal with it at our leisure. If it’s too large for that, we blow the sucker open.”
Cilla couldn’t keep the smile from her face. She’d always wanted to blow something up.
“This isn’t fun and games, Cilla,” Leo said, his chastising tone not quite mixing with the amusement in his eyes. He wanted to play with the dynamite every bit as much as she did. She knew there was a reason she couldn’t stop thinking about him.
The moment the thought invaded her mind, she pushed it back out again. No time for any of that. Now or ever.
She needed to focus on what was important. Which, at the moment, was the fact that Leo seemed to be on her side.
Brynne must have noticed the same thing. “Leo. You can’t possibly be considering this crazy plan.”
He held up his hands and opened his mouth to speak, but Cilla cut him off.
“As long as the train keeps the same schedule it has for the last five years, it’ll arrive Thursday night around two o’clock in the morning. Which means they’ll stop in Redford around midnight. They’ll unload whatever mail and cargo bound for Redford and we should have at least twenty minutes before they leave again. One of us stows away beneath the train, and the others ride ahead to the rendezvous point and wait for the train to pass by.”
“One of us will stow away? Let me guess…”
Cilla had the grace to flush, but she stuck out her chin anyway, determined to see this through.
“I’m smaller than you and lighter. I’ll fit easier and it will be easier for me to move about.”
Before he could protest, Lucy spoke up. “I’m smaller than both of you. Wouldn’t it make more sense for me to do it?”
All three of them spoke up at once. There was no way any of them would let Lucy ride beneath that train.
Lucy’s lips jutted in a pretty pout. “You can’t do this all alone, Cilla. You let me ride on raids with you. Why not this?”
“Raids are a bit different than strapping my baby sister to the bottom of a moving train,” Cilla argued.
“Exactly!” Brynne jumped in. “There is no way you are going to do this, Priscilla Richardson. I forbid it! We have to find another way to fight Frank.”
“How?” Cilla asked. “Give me another option and I’ll listen. You didn’t see what I saw, Brynne. The town has been completely overrun by Frank and his goons. They own the place. They bought out nearly every business in Bethany Ridge and those who won’t sell are terrorized out of town. And no one will accept Blood Blade’s help anymore. Frank has them so terrified that even if they don’t believe Blood Blade is the one killing everyone, they know that people are being killed in his name or because they are connected to him somehow. What else can we do?”
Brynne opened her mouth to answer but closed it again.
“Exactly,” Cilla said. “There is no other way. But if we had that gold, all that gold that Frank has wrung out of everyone, then we’d have something to bargain with. We’d have something to fight with. Without it, we are just as helpless as the townspeople.”
Leo sighed. “I hate to admit it, but she has a point.”
“Leo,” Brynne said, her voice hitching with emotion. “It’s too dangerous. It’s a suicide mission. At best, one of you will be captured, and at worst…”
Cilla spoke before Leo could. “That is true every time we walk out that door to go on a raid. Nothing has happened so far.”
“We’ve been lucky. And what do you mean, nothing? You were shot!”
Cilla rolled her eyes. “Once. It was barely more than a scratch.”
“Next time it might be more than that! Even Frank could get lucky one of these days.”
“Brynne,” Cilla said, speaking like she was trying to calm a skittish horse, “I know this is dangerous. I know what we are risking. But if we can pull this off, it’ll be over. Don’t you see? No more raids. No more risking our lives. One way or the other, we can use it to get Frank out of town. And then it will be over. We’ll be free.”
Brynne stared at Cilla, her chest heaving. But Cilla knew she was right. Even Brynne had to agree. When her sister’s shoulders slumped in defeat, Cilla knew she’d won.
Cilla looked up into the sea of stars above her head and wondered how she’d once again ended up huddled up with Leo in the dark. Oh, right. Because he was an overbearing, overprotective, completely irritating nit who refused to let her do anything on her own. She tried very hard to stamp down on the tiny part of her heart that thought his concern was sweet. She couldn’t afford to let herself dwell on any of that. He wasn’t hers, and never would be.
Maybe after they got the gold and rid the town of Frank, she could go off somewhere. Maybe go east. Or head up north. The thought of leaving her beloved ranch nearly broke her heart. But the thought of staying and watching the man she lov—watching Leo as her sister’s husband was more than she could bear.
“What are you thinking?” Leo said, moving to sit beside her.
Cilla kept her eyes on the train station several hundred yards in front of them.
“I’m thinking that it’s ridiculous that you stayed behind to babysit me. I can manage to slip onto a train by myself. You should have gone ahead with Miguel and Lucy.”
“You don’t have to do everything by yourself, you know.”
“I don’t try to do everything by myself.”
Leo snorted.
“Shut up.”
Leo’s chuckle rumbled from deep in his chest, sounding warm, guttural, and intensely virile.
And entirely too enticing. She tried to scoot a little farther away, but Leo reached out and grasped her arm. “You don’t have to move away.”
“Yes,” she said, staring up into his eyes. “I do.”
“Why? Are you going to take advantage of me, Miss Richardson?”
A smile played at his lips and it took everything Cilla had not to lean over and kiss him. She’d like very much to take advantage of him. In fact, she’d like nothing more than to taste every single, solid inch of him. Repeatedly. Until he shouted her name and begged her for mercy.
Instead, she tried to smile back.
“Something like that,” she murmured.
“Maybe I want to be taken advantage of.” He leaned in closer and Cilla prayed for strength. She reveled in the musky scent of leather and the faint hint of peppermint that always hung about him. She’d once caught him sucking on one of the candies that Mrs. Williams had slipped into her purchases. It was probably one of the things she loved most about him. Her big, strong man who loved a child’s treat. She’d never be able to smell peppermint again without thinking of him.
“This isn’t a good idea, Leo.”
“I don’t care,” he whispered, reaching out to cup her cheek.
He drew her closer and Cilla’s eyes closed as his lips brushed against hers.
A train whistle sounded and Cilla jumped up, adrenaline pumping through her system with such speed her head swam. Showtime!
She stripped off her coat and shirt, leaving her in her tight-fitting long johns and pants. She patted her hair to make sure it was bound as tightly around her
head as it could be. Any loose clothing or trailing hair would be trouble. Everything seemed to be in place.
Cilla took one step in the direction of the station, but Leo jerked her back. He grabbed her face in his hands and kissed her, good and hard, his lips crushing hers with a desperation that frightened and excited her.
Far too soon, he released her. “Be careful,” he said, kissing her once more before letting her go.
Cilla nodded and sprinted for the train, though every ounce of her being screamed at her to turn around and jump back into his arms. Maybe they could find another way to fight Frank. Maybe they could work around their situation with Brynne. Maybe they really could find a way to be together and live happily ever after.
By the time she’d reached the third “maybe,” she’d reached the train and the time for maybes was over.
Chapter Eighteen
The moment the train came to a stop, Cilla ran over, thankful for the dark night, and crawled beneath the second to last car. Aside from the passenger cars, there were two baggage cars. She couldn’t be 100 percent sure which was the right one. So she’d have to take them both.
She found a spot where several thin metal bars crisscrossed the undercarriage of the train and wedged herself as close to the front of the car as she could get. The long wedge of metal that formed the coupling link for the car jutted out in front of her. She’d have to shimmy along underneath it until she reached the pin, and then pull it out to disconnect the baggage cars from the others. And hopefully not lose her grip in the process. Or there wouldn’t be enough left of her to mourn over.
After what seemed an eternity, the train whistled and lurched forward. Cilla forced herself to loosen her grip a little, or she’d end up with cramped and useless hands. As soon as the train left the faint light of the station and began to pick up speed, Cilla closed her eyes and began to count.
Sixty seconds in a minute. Sixty minutes in an hour. Two hours to Bethany Ridge. One hour until it was time to leave her little nest. The others were supposed to meet her about halfway there. Three thousand six hundred seconds. The timing wouldn’t be exact, of course, but it was the best they could do under the circumstances. Cilla took a deep breath and forced herself to count nice and steady.
One…two…three…four…
When she reached three thousand, or as close to it as she could figure—she’d nearly lost count once or twice—she opened her eyes and started to position herself to crawl the longest three yards of her life.
They had practiced with the horse and wagon. With the wagon motionless, of course, she’d had no problem, though she tended to let her body hang too low. Then she’d moved up to Leo pushing the wagon. And then they’d tried it with the horse. She’d made it successfully from one end of the wagon to the other almost every time. She’d fallen once, but had managed to avoid the wheels. Which meant it had been painful but not fatal, though her ears were still ringing from the tongue lashing Brynne had given her.
If she fell now, though—it wouldn’t be as pretty.
Cilla forced herself to move, hugging her body to the framework of the train as much as she could. She refused to think of the tracks whizzing by beneath her. She thought of nothing but placing one hand in front of the other, inching her legs up, repeating. She kept up the steady count of seconds in her head, just so she’d have something to concentrate on other than what would happen if she lost her grip.
Three thousand three hundred and eighty-seven…shimmy forward…three thousand three hundred and eighty-eight…almost there…three thousand three hundred eighty-nine…
Finally, she made it to the link and pin that held the baggage car to the car in front of it. Cilla risked a glance up, craning her head to look at the light spilling from the passenger car just ahead.
It was a mistake.
Her head swam, the swaying light from the lantern near the back door, along with the jolting of the train and the speed of the blurry scenery flashing by her in the night, wreaking havoc with her senses. She wrapped her body around the coupling for all she was worth.
Focus!
Hugging the coupling link wasn’t the smartest thing in the world to do either. The link and pin weren’t always the sturdiest of couplings and the cars had a tendency to shift while they were moving. If something went wrong, there was a good chance she’d be crushed between the cars and get run over by the train. A lovely thought.
Cilla scooted forward a tad more and finally saw the pin just above her. She reached up and grasped it, pulling with all her might.
It didn’t budge. She’d known it wouldn’t be easy, but she couldn’t help feeling a frantic disappointment anyway.
She tried again. And again. The third time she pulled, she felt it give way a bit. Then a bit more.
“Come on,” she muttered, her jaw clenched so tightly it began to ache. “Come on!”
A few more tugs and the pin moved. Cilla renewed her grip, closed her eyes, and pulled with everything she had—a little too much.
When the pin released, Cilla’s arm flew out, and for a second, the pin in her hand hit the ground, jarring her arm. She hugged the coupling tighter with her other arm and tossed the pin out to the side, hoping it would get lost in the shrubbery somewhere. With any luck, the crew wouldn’t have the right-sized spare on board and the baggage cars would be stranded for a while.
Cilla wrapped her arm around the coupling again and breathed a huge sigh of relief as the cars started to lose their momentum. Her muscles were beginning to twitch and quiver, and when the cars finally slowed to a stop, she dropped gratefully to the ground.
She couldn’t rest for long though. Whoever was in the baggage car had noticed that the train was no longer moving and was kicking up a terrible ruckus.
Time for step two.
…
“Here it comes!” Lucy said, her horse prancing beneath her as it picked up on her excitement.
Leo didn’t share her enthusiasm. His gut was twisted into a knot so tight he could barely breathe.
Was she still beneath the train? Or had she fallen and been crushed by the massive iron wheels?
He closed his eyes for a moment, trying to banish that thought from his head. Priscilla Richardson was a stubborn, headstrong, determined, spitfire of girl who wouldn’t let a little thing like a several-ton locomotive barreling across the landscape get in the way of what she wanted.
She was fine. She had to be.
The train pulled even with where they waited in the dark, close enough for them to see it, but far enough away that the passengers would never be able to spot them. And far enough away that he couldn’t see if the woman whom he suspected might just be the love of his life was still clinging to the underbelly of the iron beast rumbling past.
Leo turned his horse, ready to ride after it. He watched the cars go by. The locomotive. The passenger cars.
And two baggage cars, still attached.
A jolt of pure terror and pain struck him so fiercely he had to suck in a breath. It didn’t mean anything that the cars were still attached. The timing hadn’t been precise. It wasn’t as if she had a pocket watch strapped there with her.
He kicked his horse into a gallop and thundered after the train, barely noticing if Lucy was following along behind him. They rode for several minutes. It had to be soon. If she was still there and could still pull the pin, it had to be soon. His horse was tiring. And he was sure Cilla would be too.
The train pulled ahead of them. The horses wouldn’t be able to keep up much longer. Leo resisted the almost overwhelming urge to move closer, to pull up alongside the train and make sure Cilla was all right. But they had to stick to the plan: keep their distance until the cars were disconnected and well separated from the rest of the train. Alerting those on the train to their presence wouldn’t do Cilla any good.
The train was now far enough ahead of them that Leo was having a hard time seeing it clearly. When they came upon a copse of trees, he cursed, forced to slow hi
s pace as they made their way through. He turned to be sure Lucy was keeping up. She was right on his tail, concern breaking through the exhilaration on her face.
The trees thinned out and Leo spurred his horse again, the guilt he felt for driving the animal so hard eclipsed by his growing panic for Cilla. In the distance, he could just make out the baggage cars of the train. He couldn’t be sure but—yes! It looked as though they were slowing down while the rest of the train pulled ahead!
He wasn’t relieved yet—wouldn’t be until she was safe on the ground. But the vice around his chest eased up a hair. Leo guided his horse up a small hill, irritated at having to go a little out of his way, though the higher ground gave him a greater vantage point to view the train.
The baggage cars had come to a complete stop while the rest of the train continued on its way through the night, unaware as yet that it had lost part of its load. Lucy reined in beside him and gave him a relieved smile. She turned to gallop down the hill, eager to complete the next phase of their plan: disarm whoever might be on guard and get the gold.
“Wait!” Leo whispered, grabbing for Lucy’s bridle.
There was movement in the dark, a single figure creeping around to the back entrance of the car.
Cilla!
His heart pounded, adrenaline rushing through his veins with such force he nearly had to bite his tongue to keep from hollering out to her.
That amazing, mule-headed woman had actually pulled it off!
Lucy had spotted her as well and turned to him with a huge smile. “She made it!”
“Let’s go help her finish the job,” Leo said, returning her smile.
But before they could signal the horses to move, the side doors of both cars opened, spilling lantern light into the dark night. A dozen men poured from each car, each armed and ready. The men surrounded the lone figure in black.
“No!” Lucy sobbed.
She leaned forward but Leo kept a tight hold of her bridle, though it took everything in him not to race down the hill to Cilla’s rescue.
“We can’t, Lucy.”
“What?” she rounded on him. “We can’t just leave her there! We have to go help her!”
Blood Blade Sisters Series (Entangled Scandalous) Page 17