Clay turned to him to hide his turbulent emotions. Even now, fear clawed in his gut. He should never have agreed to let the girl work with explosives, but it was the only way he could give her the mining partnership that seemed to matter so much to her. He forced a casual tone. “We didn’t allow for the damp air in the mine and the draft that blows through the funnel. The fuses were slow to light. And I spent a moment pulling out the aspen trunk, in case it might constrain the force of the blast.”
“But we did it,” the girl said. “I’m sure it worked.”
Mr. Hicks picked up one of the lanterns. “Let’s go and see.”
Clay held up a warning hand. “Don’t be a fool. Wait an hour or two. Let the fumes clear and the dust settle.”
“I’ve waited for thirty years. I’ll not wait a second longer,” the old man said and walked off.
Clay turned to the girl. “Go into the kitchen and stay there.” When she opened her mouth in protest, he cut her off. “I don’t want you in that mine until I can be sure it’s safe, even if it means I’ll have to truss you up and hog-tie you. Do you promise to keep out?”
Clay could see rebellion flash across the girl’s dust-smeared features. Then she gave a reluctant nod. “I’ll make coffee and start supper.”
Clay picked up the other lantern and went after the old man. The mine tunnel smelled of smoke and gunpowder. Dust hung thick in the air, stinging his eyes and filling his lungs. Clay coughed, hurried to catch up with the old man. In the funnel, the edge of the fissure had broken off cleanly and loose rocks filled the gap.
Mr. Hicks spun around. “I’ll get a pickaxe.”
“Wait until morning,” Clay cautioned him.
“No.” Fevered impatience burned in the old man’s eyes.
Clay shrugged. Sleep would elude them anyway, and it made no difference in the mine if it was day or night. “I’ll get the mule,” he said. “We can tie a chain around the bigger rocks and use the mule to haul them aside.”
All through the night they worked, muscles straining, sweat pouring off their bodies, their skin scraped raw as they levered the rocks and rubble out of the way. Annabel kept her promise and stayed out, serving food and coffee in the kitchen.
Heavy clouds covered the sky, obliterating the moon. The wind had gathered force and howled along the cliffs. There seemed to be something ominous about the solid darkness of the night, but Clay told himself it was fatigue and tension stirring up his imagination.
When the first hint of dawn appeared in the sky, they had cleared away the loose rocks and rubble to open a passage into the cave. The opening was six feet high, straight on one side and curved in the other, in the shape of the capital letter D.
By an unspoken consent, the men had waited to inspect the seam of gold until they had finished the work. In the early-morning light Clay rubbed down the mule, led him out to pasture and strode back up the slope into the kitchen.
“Moment of truth,” he said. “Is it gold or pyrite?”
The girl snapped her head up and stared at him, aghast. “Do you think...?”
He shifted one shoulder. “It’s an easy mistake to make. You’re no expert.”
Her eyes pleaded at him. “Can I come with you?”
Clay considered a moment, relented. “All right. As long as you stay behind me.”
They trooped into the mine, each carrying a lantern, and went through the hole, the old man first. Clay followed him and turned around to hold up his light for the girl. She entered the cave, took three paces forward, studied the layout and adjusted her position to the left.
“Here.” She extended one arm ahead of her. “It runs this way.”
Together, they lifted their lanterns high and lowered them toward the floor in a slow, ceremonial motion. When lamplight fell on a glittering snake by their feet, the old man gave a fraught cry and sank to his knees. He put his lantern down and scrabbled with both hands, cleaning away the layer of detritus that covered the bedrock.
“Is it gold?” the girl asked in a voice that trembled.
“It’s gold all right.” Dreamy, reverent, the old man traced his fingers along the sparkling seam, then lowered his head and touched the ground with his lips.
“Careful,” Clay said wryly. “It’s bat droppings you’re kissing.”
“It’s gold,” Mr. Hicks spoke in awe. “There must be a million dollars’ worth beneath our feet. More, if the vein goes deep. And it will be easy to dig out. Almost as easy as shoveling sand into a bucket at the beach.”
Clay held his lantern high above his head and inspected the ceiling. The air in the cave seemed unusually damp. He couldn’t decide if it was just the change in the weather, or if an underground watercourse ran somewhere nearby.
He noticed a series of dark lines in the domed roof of the cave. Several thin cracks crossed over each other to form a straggly maze. He lifted one arm to indicate the pattern. “Kid, did you notice these cracks in the rock before?”
The girl tipped her head back to stare up at the ceiling. “I don’t remember seeing them, but I’m not as tall as you, so the light from my lantern didn’t reach as far. They could have been there but I failed to notice them.”
Thoughtful, Clay studied the pattern of the fault lines. They could have been there for thousands of years. Or the gunpowder blast last night might have created them, destabilizing the structure of the cliffs.
He lowered the light and shined it on the faces of his partners. “I don’t want the kid working in the cave. The roof may be unsound.”
“But I—”
He cut her off. “If you don’t agree to stay out of the cave, I’ll ride out before sundown. You two can keep the gold. I hope you’ll live to enjoy it.”
Clay could feel his body shaking with anger as he strode out, the lantern light casting flickering shadows on the tunnel walls. Did Mr. Hicks not see the danger? Did he not value his life? The old man had no right to inject his craving for riches into the mind of the girl and lure her into taking crazy risks.
The girl had wanted to crawl into the cave and set the charges to achieve something, to prove equal in the partnership. Clay had sympathized with her need, had been willing to help, but he drew the line at letting her court death.
His mind filled with restless images. The charred remains of a burnt-out wagon. The sound of coughing and the memory of blood-spotted handkerchiefs. The rumble of an explosion and the smell of burning flesh.
He’d lost his parents. He’d lost the two closest friends he’d ever had. He might not be able to stop Mr. Hicks from sacrificing his life in search for gold, but he’d be damned if he stood by and watched the girl go the same way.
Chapter Thirteen
Thick clouds covered the dawn sky as they settled down to catch up on sleep under the overhang. An hour later, the sky burst into a deluge that drummed against the cliffs. Clay lay awake, listening to the sound of pebbles rattling down the slope and worrying about the fault lines in the roof of the cave.
At midday, when they got up, the downpour had passed but a cool mist hung over the hilltops and the paths were slippery with mud. Mr. Hicks barely paused for coffee before grabbing a pickaxe and heading off into the mine.
“You should pan the last of the gravel in the arrastre,” he told Clay before he hurried away. “I don’t want the new ore mixing with the old.”
After extracting a promise from the girl to keep out of the mine, Clay left her in the kitchen, uncertain if he could trust her. She rewarded his faith by appearing at the creek. Without a word she took the water hose from him and directed the stream onto the pulverized ore.
As Clay cranked the handle of the rocker box, he couldn’t prevent his eyes from sliding over the girl’s slender shape. In the cave, while they practiced lighting the fuses, he had put his hands on her to pull her ou
t, and during the blast he had shielded her body with his, but those times had been efficient, businesslike, and he had not allowed his thoughts to dwell on the kiss they had shared.
Now he gave his imagination free rein. He pictured the girl stripped half-naked, bending over the stone by the stream to wash her hair, the way he’d seen her once before. Then recalled the feel of her body beneath his, soft and warm, the way it had been when he lay on top of her by the arrastre pit. What would it be like, to combine those two memories? How would it feel, to press his body against hers without the barrier of clothing separating them?
“Penny for your thoughts,” the girl said.
Clay contemplated her, unsmiling. “They are worth much more than that. They are worth all the gold in the cave.”
“What...?” She flustered and let her voice trail away.
They both knew what she’d been about to ask. What were you thinking? As their gazes collided and held, Clay knew she could read the answer in his eyes, could see the hunger in them, and the hesitation, too.
A slow blush rose from the collar of the girl’s threadbare shirt all the way up to her tattered bowler hat. She started to speak, appeared not to find the words, and chose to remain silent.
“You can take off your hat, you know,” Clay said quietly. “You might like to wash your hair. Mr. Hicks will not come down here. You couldn’t pry him out of that cave with a crowbar.”
He could see the girl’s throat ripple as she swallowed. Her neck was slender and very white. Once again, Clay wondered how he could ever have mistaken her for a boy.
“I don’t have my soap,” she pointed out.
“I’d like to see your hair.”
Slowly, as if walking onto thin ice—which Clay recognized tempting a man might in a way be for a girl—she lifted one hand to her head and knocked down her bowler hat to reveal the shiny black tresses pinned into tight coils.
“Take your hair down.” Clay could hear the roughness in his voice. Take your hair down—or run away as fast as you can, he wanted to add, for within him he felt the long-denied pressures snapping out of control.
As if sensing his dark, brooding mood and wanting to disperse it with a burst of sunlight, the girl laughed and shook her head. She made a move, as if to put the water hose down, so she could pluck the pins out of her hair, but at the last moment she altered the course of her action and lifted the hose, dousing him with the spray.
The stream was running high after the rain, the water pressure greater than normal, and the icy current hit him in the gut, cooling the surge of heat in his body, perhaps more effectively than the girl might have guessed.
Entering the spirit of fun, Clay let out a roar. He released his grip on the handle of the rocker box and dived for the girl. For an instant, they grappled for the hose. Clay restricted his strength to make the battle last a moment longer. Then he tossed the hose aside, scooped the girl into his arms and dunked her in the stream.
Shrieking yet laughing, eyes shining with merriment despite the scowl of indignation on her face, the girl clung to him, her arms wrapped around his neck. Clay’s boots skidded in the mud, causing him to fall to his knees. His hat toppled from his head, and his hair, grown too long, flopped over his eyes.
Going still in his arms, the girl untangled one arm from around his neck and brushed back the curls from his forehead. Her touch was gentle, and when she looked up at him, Clay could see in her eyes everything a man could hope to see in the eyes of the girl he wanted—trust and tenderness and the spark of passion.
The sun broke between the clouds, making the ground steam on the banks of the creek. He was kneeling in the stream, the girl cradled in his arms, the current flowing cool and refreshing over them. Their wet clothing clung to their bodies, a barrier so insignificant they might as well be naked.
Clay lowered his head. Ever since he first kissed Annabel, he’d been burning with the fever to do it again. The strength of the urge baffled him, for he’d always told himself he derived no true satisfaction from casual intimacies. Emotionally, such encounters left him feeling even more isolated and alone, but now a storm of need raged inside him, a hunger like he’d never experienced before.
Slowly, he bent his head to the girl resting in his lap. At the same time, she leaned upward to meet him. He could feel the fine trembling in her body, could feel the warm puff of their breaths mingling when their lips were only a fraction apart.
For an instant, Clay halted, anticipating the pleasure, letting the desire build and build and build inside him, until it was so immense he would gladly have given up his share of the gold to feel her mouth beneath his.
Finally, he settled his lips against Annabel’s. This time, her response was bolder. She made a small, eager sound in her throat, clung tighter to him and parted her lips, inviting him inside, inviting him to deepen the kiss. Again, the elation Clay remembered from their first kiss flowed through him—a strange mix of being at peace and a tension so overwhelming he felt he was about to lose his sanity.
For long moments, he kept the kiss going, while he fought to control his senses, but they refused to bend to his will. All he could think about was Annabel pressed against him, her body supple and slender, her lips soft and willing.
Finally, Clay lifted his head and studied her flushed face. With his hand he touched her lips, as if to check if his kiss had left something there, like a brand of ownership. He saw the trusting look in her eyes, felt her mouth quiver beneath his fingertips, and a sudden feeling of contentment stole over him. Never had he understood there could be such pleasure in simply holding a woman in his arms.
Perhaps it was not casual intimacies that left him wanting, Clay decided, but intimacy without affection. Or maybe with Annabel there was nothing casual about it. The thought crossed his mind as he lowered his mouth to hers again.
And then, just as Clay was about to slide his hand along her chest to cup one of those rosy-tipped breasts he kept dreaming about, a low rumble echoed down the hillside and the ground beneath them shook with a slow, rolling tremor.
* * *
Clay raced up the path, past the arrastre, across the clearing, along the cliff face, his boots pounding against the rain-sodden earth. Like a yawning black mouth, the mine entrance gaped in front of him. Behind him, he could hear the girl’s urgent footsteps.
“Stay back,” he yelled, even though he knew she would refuse to obey.
He darted into the mine tunnel. The air was humid and heavy with dust. Somewhere ahead he could hear water trickling. After the sharp twist to the left, he lost the last glimmer of daylight. No lantern glow shone through the opening they had blasted into the cave.
“Get a lantern from the kitchen,” Clay called out to the girl. Not only did he need a source of light, but the task would get her out of the mine for a moment, perhaps saving her life if another tremor rocked the earth.
Trailing his hands against the slippery walls now gritty with dust, Clay found his way through the darkness to the funnel opening. He took out a match, scraped it against the rock. Once the match caught, he held it up. The flame did not flicker, indicating the lack of any draft.
He moved the match up and down, left and right, illuminating the barrier in front of him. He could see only a solid heap of rock and rubble, filling not only the cave entrance but also part of the mine tunnel.
“Mr. Hicks!” he yelled.
No reply came, but Clay knew the thick layer of earth would have dulled the sound. The flame burned away, scorching his fingers, and he dropped the spent match, letting it hiss out against the damp ground.
With a fevered urgency, Clay tackled the rockfall, rolling stones aside, scooping out loose gravel with his bare hands, working by touch in the complete darkness. From the corner of his eye he could see a sphere of light bobbing up and down along the mine tunnel as Annabel returned wi
th a lantern.
When she got closer, Clay glanced at her. Hatless, her tightly coiled hair shining wet from the dunking in the stream, her eyes wide with fear, she looked feminine and fragile and frightened. Pausing in his labors for a second, Clay reached for the lantern and set it down on the ground past the rockfall.
“What is it?” the girl asked.
“Landslide...the roof was unsound...the rain brought it down.” He spoke in bursts between heaving the stones aside.
Annabel stepped forward to join him in the effort. “No,” he told her. “Get me a shovel and a pickaxe.” He threw her another quick glance. “Can you find your way out without a light?”
She nodded. “I’ll bring the whale oil lamp.” They had only one coal oil lantern they could use. The other two were in the cave with Mr. Hicks.
Not replying, Clay braced his shoulder against a boulder and strained his muscles to roll it aside. By the time the girl returned, he had made enough of a dent in the rubble to uncover a huge slab of rock that only gunpowder would shift.
Pickaxe in one hand, Clay banged the iron tip against the stone. The clang made a sharp sound in the dimly lit tunnel. They waited. The silence seemed impenetrable, as if the whole world had ceased to hold its breath.
Then from the other side came a muffled echo. Tap-tap-tap.
Clay lifted the pickaxe, banged the rock three times.
The answer came. Tap-tap-tap.
“He is alive.” Relief pouring over him, Clay turned to the girl. “Set the whale oil lamp to burn halfway down the tunnel, so the light will guide you in and out. Then fetch a canteen of water and some food.”
With a quick nod, the girl hurried off. A fleeting thought crossed Clay’s mind that she was growing up, learning to overcome those weeping bouts of nerves he’d witnessed a couple of times before.
Dismissing all thoughts except those of getting through to his friend and mentor, Clay bent back to the wall of rubble and attacked it with the pickaxe. In a blaze of effort he worked, pausing only once in a while to tap at the rock and to hear the reply from the other side.
From Runaway to Pregnant Bride Page 13