Ahead of him, dust rose up around a mob of men. Most of them wore jackets with patches, from what he could see, and cowboy hats. They raised axes and shotguns, and an older gentleman brandished a pitchfork. Gentleman, ha.
“President Wilcox forever!”
“Senator Treasure wants to tear apart the country!”
Jeremiah adjusted his grip on the laser rifle. The ranch hands stood at his sides with guns in hand and pistols on their belts, knives in their boots. The servants waited behind the front line, also armed, and the females were at the house, ready in case any fireballs came their way.
That had happened down south. Senators lost their homes when mobs lobbed fireballs.
He hated the thought of Alyssa and his mother armed in the doorway, but he knew both of them would shoot before they lost anything of value.
“Fight, men,” Jeremiah said. “These ruffians aren’t looking for the truth, and they won’t want to negotiate. Shoot to kill.”
That was what Clark would do.
One of his ranch hands fired, a younger fellow who had wandered in from the desert and Garth had given him a place —probably out of kindness to Clark’s early plight.
So Clark would have specified to everyone not to fire until the bad guys did.
The mob shouted louder and dashed forward. Bullets pinged off the dirt and lodged into the wooden fence.
“Shoot them,” Jeremiah shouted. More gunfire erupted around him. His ranch hands dashed forward. Jeremiah cocked the rifle and shot at the nearest mobster, a man with a hatchet.
A blossom of blood formed in the enemy’s forehead, and the man slumped forward in a graceful arch.
Dead.
No one messed with the Treasures.
Jeremiah cocked the laser rifle again, aimed at the next oncoming villain, and fired.
arth could see the president’s face when he closed his eyes. Black hair, graying at the temple, and a bald spot forming up top. Small, dark eyes, the corners bloodshot, dark half-moons beneath as a sign of sleep deprivation.
Skin paler than Garth had ever seen before.
The man had known they would find him guilty. He had planned killings and run, like a coward. All of his actions had been cowardly.
“Steam tanks.” The words snared Garth’s attention back to the meeting room.
“You can have full control of the steam tanks,” one senator told the army captain. “They are still in the experimental phase, but they might come in handy.”
Steam tanks. The army would drag steam tanks across the country and its president, still beloved by too many, would allow it to happen rather than turn himself in. Despicable. The tanks would tear up the land. People would cower, and it would be the army and senators at fault.
Garth pushed back from the table and headed into the hallway; no one called him back. Darkness seemed to have crept into the corners.
“They can’t let this go on.” Garth leaned against the railing to overlook the president’s garden. So many gardens in the land. The country should be beautiful. Instead, the gardens hid darkness. Cruelty.
Clark joined him, sighing. “Jas will find the president—”
“This is going to become a mockery.” Garth rubbed his hand across his face. Inside the mansion, voices emerged in heated speech. They planned and plotted, wanted to rip up all the beauty. “The prince will make a public spectacle of the president. If he finds him, the trial won’t go on.”
Clark stared at the balcony floor. “You don’t know Jas.”
But Clark did, and his deep tone didn’t bely Garth’s words. The prince would string him up and if the army found Wilcox, he might not even make it back to the trial. Those who hated him might kill him or those who worshipped him might free him.
Clark stiffened.
“What is it?” Garth asked.
“Albert. Uncle Albert.” Clark licked his lips as he stared at a spot near the double glass doors leading inside. “He’s found the hideout.”
“What?” A chill crawled over Garth’s skin beneath his suit.
“He knows where Wilcox is.” Clark clenched his fist over the balcony railing.
“Excellent. We’ll go tell—”
Clark seized Garth’s arm as he headed toward the meeting room. “No. I’ll go get him.” Clark grinned, but the curve of his lips didn’t reach his eyes. “He deserves some Western justice, don’t you think?”
“Water,” the man on the hospital cot rasped. His lips had split from dryness, and his skin stretched too severely over his cheekbones. “Water…”
“Here.” Amethyst’s hand shook as she lifted the glass to his mouth. He’d groaned for hours. Each time she walked down the aisle between bed rows, he had croaked out the same thing.
“Stop.” A nurse waddled toward them from across the room. “He can’t swallow. There’s a problem with his throat. You must use an eye dropper.”
Amethyst jerked away from the bed, water sloshing over the rim of the glass to soak into her white blouse.
“An eye dropper,” the nurse repeated. “I’ll get one for you.”
“I-I’m sorry. I didn’t know.” Hospitals chilled her. Suffering and sickness. During her finishing school days, she had volunteered at one with her classmates, but they had sat with patients on the mend to read to them. She had knitted socks one year as well, but a servant had delivered them.
She’d never been in the intensive care unit. Bloody bandages wrapped around limbs. The moans. The dying gurgles. For those victims, she had brought them back, and the ability had healed the wounds. She could heal the others, though. They still lived.
“Let me show you.” The nurse’s statement made Amethyst jump. Her brown corset had never felt so tight; she wanted to tear off the laces and gulp lungfuls of air.
Amethyst nodded to the nurse and stepped back, offering the drink. The nurse accepted the glass and dipped an eyedropper into it.
“You don’t have to be embarrassed about not knowing what to do here,” the nurse said. “If you plan to stay longer, we can assign you some simple tasks.”
Amethyst parted her lips, a stray curl falling free from her chignon. “I’d like that.” Everyone in the unit had been a victim of the presidential versus princely debate. They had gotten to see the terror inflicted by mobs.
“Love.” Clark hurried down the aisle toward her.
She grabbed him by the shoulders and pressed her face into his neck. Sleeping with him at night couldn’t give her the comfort fill. She needed him at her side. She needed him to be her strength.
If only they could go home… go back to Jolene… return to parties and benefits.
But the victims needed care.
“Come with me for a second,” he whispered in her ear.
She held up one finger to the nurse to show she would be right back and allowed him to lead her into the hallway. Her husband pulled her back into his arms, breathing against her hair. “Uncle Albert found me today.”
“Oh?” She fought Clark’s lips to kiss them, hard, seeking out his tongue to touch hers to it.
“He knows where Wilcox is.”
“What?” She jerked back, but he kept his grip on her.
“He’s hiding out in Hedlund. They call them Tin Caverns because rocks always fall and you can hear them. They echo as if they strike tin.”
“You’ve been there before?”
“Once. I didn’t stay long. No one does.” He grimaced. “Apparently our good ol’ president found a place to stay in there. I haven’t told anyone other than your father.”
Of course Clark wouldn’t spread the news. “You’re going after him yourself.” Her heartbeat sped up and fuzziness toyed with her brain.
“Yes.” He cupped her cheek before kissing her lower lip.
“I’m coming with you.”
“I know.” He grinned. “I’ve stopped begging you to stay behind.”
Amethyst adjusted her grip on the steamcycle. Even through the helmet, the sounds of c
rashing rocks reached her. They echoed up from the brown stone walls like the calls of the dead.
Only, the dead stood on top. Men and women hovered around the crevice as if lost, pondering which way to go next.
Uncle Albert followed Clark and Amethyst. He had stayed at their side, his expression unreadable. Now that they had stopped their vehicles, he drew in front of them.
Clark unhooked his helmet and nodded at Uncle Albert as he talked, the words muffled for Amethyst. She snapped the hook and pulled off hers; the cavern crashes pummeled against her skull and she cringed.
“Why did you ever go down there?” she blurted out.
Uncle Albert and Clark both glanced at her.
“I had to,” Clark said. “I knew the army wouldn’t follow me.”
The army had chased an innocent boy into that.
“He has a hidden chamber,” Uncle Albert said. “I’ll lead you to the entrance. There’s a lever he pulls.”
“How does he get sustenance? Is there another entrance?” Clark asked.
“Two men bring him items periodically. There is a narrow exit that leads about three miles away. It is packed with supplies, but when we get inside, I’ll show you where it is.”
“Good.” Clark nodded as he stepped off the cycle and hooked his helmet over the handlebars.
“What are you doing? We are miles away from the cavern. We can’t walk that far,” Amethyst sputtered. They needed a fast getaway. If rocks started falling, they couldn’t outrun them.
He tugged her helmet from her hands. “We have to walk. The vibrations of the cycles might loosen more rocks and the path down there is pretty treacherous.”
Rocks closing in around her. Amethyst gulped. “Right.” Not right. They had to find another way that didn’t involve walking.
He clasped her hand and lifted it to kiss her knuckles through her leather gloves. “We won’t need a fast getaway, love.”
“Why?”
“Because I plan on walking President Wilcox out of there in chains.”
Right. The caboose attached to the back of his cycle. Funny, she planned on seeing President Wilcox dead.
The rocks trembled beneath Amethyst’s boot. “Bloody gears.” Her heel slid and she fell to her bottom, scraping her palms along the rough earth.
“You hurt?” Clark kept his tone pitched low.
Her dignity. Plus, she had some bruises. Scowling, Amethyst shook her head. “I’m fine.” They couldn’t go back over some bumps. It had taken long enough to trek from the cycles. Only half a mile, as he’d kindly corrected her assumption that it would be miles.
He stayed a few feet ahead of her, their bodies connected by two harnesses. If one fell, the other could try to catch them. She had a feeling it was more for her benefit than his; she would never be able to pull him back up.
Shadows danced around the rocks that jutted from the walls of the cavern. The sun still shone in the cloudless blue sky —the sun over Hedlund Territory always seemed ready to bake her —but the area around them appeared dark. Dust thickened the air and heat radiated off the pale surfaces around them.
Sweat coated her skin with a sheen for the dust to stick to.
“Bloody gears.” She gripped the rock she’d fallen off of and slid, pawing with her foot for the next spot.
“Jump. I’ll catch you,” Clark whispered.
At least they could bring each other back to life so long as they both didn’t die. She closed her eyes and released the rock. His hands gripped her hips a second later.
“How much longer?” Her arms and legs ached, and her feet felt swollen from the walk alone. Too bad she couldn’t use Eric’s wings to soar down, but Clark had called them too dangerous.
“You might crash and knock more rocks loose,” he’d said in that annoying, always-correct way.
“Let me guess.” She groaned as she peered down the steep incline to the bottom of the cavern where it appeared to be more loose ground rather than a walking path. “We have another twenty-minutes before we get there?”
He laughed and kissed the top of her hair. His scruff came away beige with dirt. “I love you, Am. It will probably be another forty-five minutes to an hour.”
Perfect. She lifted her hands and groaned, but he held his finger to her lips.
“Quiet, love.”
Of course she would have to be quiet when all she wanted to do was scream her frustration.
lark pulled the pistol from his leather holster and cocked it. Stones crunched beneath his boots as he sidled sideways toward the boulder Uncle Albert indicated. The last time he’d been in the canyon, he hadn’t look around. He hadn’t looked back. Clark had plummeted over the rocks, and at first, the army had sent pistols pinging off near his feet before a general yelled, “Careful or you’ll hit him.”
They didn’t want him dead —he was needed alive —only frightened. Brass glass, had he been frightened. Most of the descent he’d fallen, and at the bottom, he’d had a black eye, bloody nose, split lip, and scratches everywhere. He’d felt his limbs to make sure nothing had broken.
Down at the bottom, he had hidden behind boulders, waiting for a soldier to grab him, or a snake bite to do him away. Neither of them had come, and eventually he’d made his way back out the other side and skedaddled, finding a Bromi tribe to shelter him while he healed.
“Is this all from nature?” Amethyst asked from behind him.
Clark glanced over his shoulder. She had to be petrified, but she smiled at him, her eyes wide and her lips trembling. She never allowed fear to root her feet in place.
“Mining,” he whispered. “It shook up the ground and made it unsteady. They had to abandon the mine and then this place showed up.”
Clark studied the rocks, but none looked as if they wanted to crush them at any second, despite the thumps that sounded from farther down the cavern. He took another step toward where Uncle Albert floated and Amethyst followed him. From the corners of his eyes, he could see her wobbling, her steps ginger, arms outstretched for balance on the uneven ground.
He had to keep her behind him once he entered the president’s domain, but she would work out well as backup. President Wilcox and anyone with him might not expect her to fire.
“Here.” Uncle Albert pointed at the rocks.
Clark crouched and tapped the brim of his cowboy hat with his pistol to adjust the shade on his eyes. A dark crevice crept between the boulder and the stone wall. He pulled a bandana from his pocket to brush at the dirt; a flash of metal caught the sunlight.
A brass lever.
He grinned at Amethyst before gripping the lever and pulling downward. Steam hissed from around the boulder and it shifted outward. Clark stood, the pistol gripped in one hand, his other arm held in a way to block Amethyst from whatever dwelled inside.
That happened to be a metal hallway with a rounded ceiling. He nodded for her to follow him and took a step inside. The rock floor didn’t give and nothing beeped from the walls.
Once, he had ridden with a gang down in southern Hedlund. One of the girls had driven over a hidden mine and it had beeped a few seconds before exploding, tearing her up, shredding her cycle, and sending the others skidding across the desert.
The beep returned to haunt his mind.
He took another step forward and Amethyst joined them, their footsteps muffled. He nodded to her again before increasing his pace. The tunnel curved to the right and opened into a room with a vaulted ceiling. A long table took up the center space, with metal chairs around it, and cabinets lined the wall. Someone had pushed a sleeping cot against it.
President Wilcox lay sprawled on the cot, a quilt rumpled beneath him, with a book open in his hands.
“Jeremy, I thought—” He looked up and paled.
Clark leaned his hip against the hallway, hoping Amethyst would stay hidden around the bend, and leveled the pistol at President Wilcox. “Expecting the vice president? Sorry, but he’s not coming for you.”
He had better
not be on his way behind them.
Amethyst froze. The president’s voice danced down the tunnel to her, accompanied by the whir of steam-powered fans.
“Clark Grisham.” He laughed, but the pitch strained. He was nervous.
“I’ve come to take you back to court.” A rustle and a click let her know Clark had drawn his other pistol.
“You won’t shoot me.”
“I won’t need to. You’ll come with me.”
When they got the president close enough, they could use the rope looped at Clark’s belt to tie him up. They could make that treacherous climb back up and be done with the hunt.
“Maybe you will shoot me,” the president said. “I’ve done some horrible things.” His voice sounded closer although she couldn’t hear any footsteps. Amethyst held her breath to help still her pounding heartbeat.
“You know,” he continued in a growl, “I’ve come to really hate you. You’re a traitor to this country, Clark Grisham. Why do you have to fight everything this country does? Your abilities shouldn’t be wasted on personal vendettas. You should be helping the country.”
Clark had never asked for the gift. He didn’t have to do what the president wanted. Amethyst winced. In a way, she had asked for the ability…
“That’s not under debate right now,” Clark said.
The president muttered something and laughed. “You think you’re so righteous, but you’re scared to even fight for your own country. We need your ability. Why else do you think I kidnapped your daughter?”
Clark’s blood seemed to thicken. Anger burned along his eyes and across his skin.
Kidnapped your daughter.
No.
The president stood beside the cot with his book still in hand, but he tossed it down and frowned. “You didn’t know that? I thought for sure it would come out sooner or later in the trials.”
Clark adjusted his grip on the pistols to refrain from punching the president until his facial bones snapped.
Wicked Treasure (Treasure Chronicles Book 3) Page 22