Vote Then Read: Volume III

by Aleatha Romig

  "I will."

  Michael pulled his attention away from Cara and Loralee, glancing up at the sun. It was already beginning to climb in the sky. It was time to go. He looked down at his brother, meeting his solemn gaze. "Watch out for yourself."

  "It's not me riding into danger," Patrick said. "You keep your eyes open. I'd just as soon not have to bury you twice."

  Michael rubbed his injured shoulder. "My sentiments exactly. So you get your ass to Silverthread and then up to the Promise. I'm counting on you to watch my back."

  Patrick nodded, the trace of a grin relieving the tension etched on his face. He raised a hand in farewell. "Good hunting."

  Patrick kept a tight rein on the horses, trying to keep the wagon from bouncing too much on the rutted street. Loralee was in back, Pete's head on her lap. His face was still pale, but his fever seemed to have broken. Arless' body was back there, too, underneath a blanket, silent testimony to everything that had happened.

  The noise of the town was almost deafening. Men lined the streets, about half of them staggering their way home for a few winks before their next shifts started, the other half heading for the saloons, ready for some action now that their shifts were over.

  None of the more respectable people of Silverthread were to be seen on Gin Avenue, as it had most suitably been named. All told there were about thirty-five drinking establishments open along the street and that wasn't even counting the tents that consisted of nothing more than a whiskey barrel with a plank that served as a bar.

  But that's where Doc kept his office—closer to the action no doubt. Although lots of injuries occurred up at the mines, a more impressive number happened right here in the middle of all the taverns, drink tending to make a man a little less cautious and often times a hell of a lot more foolish.

  The occasional cat-call or whistle marked their passing, but for the most part they might as well have been invisible. People in Silverthread tended to mind their own business. He pulled the wagon to a halt in front of Doc's office and jumped down. "How's he doing?" He shot a worried look at the old ranch hand.

  "Better I think. Although the bouncing broke open the wound. He'd bleeding again." Loralee kept her eyes on Pete. They'd hardly spoken since Michael and Cara left. Each lost in their own thoughts.

  "Quit talkin' about me as if I was dead already. I ain't." Pete's opened his eyes, and struggled to a sitting position. "'Course if you take me in there," he jerked his head at the office behind him, "my chances of kicking the bucket before my time go up considerably."

  "You hush, now, Pete." Loralee ran a soothing hand across the old man's cheek. "Doc needs to see to that leg of yours, and no backtalk is going to change my mind."

  Pete frowned, and Patrick bit back a smile. "Come on old man, let's get this over with."

  "I ain't old. And I don't need no help." Pete scooted off the wagon, but almost toppled over when he tried to stand on his injured leg.

  Patrick quickly flanked him on one side, an arm going around his waist for support.

  Pete grinned weakly. "Well, maybe a little help wouldn't be out of line."

  Doc Whatley appeared on his other side, lending more support. "Looks like you ran into a little trouble, Pete." They started to walk slowly toward the office door.

  "Nothing I couldn't handle. Just didn't want to worry these young folks none." Despite his brave words, Pete's breath was coming in little gasps. "Arless is back there."

  "He need help?" Doc shot a concerned look back at the wagon.

  Patrick shook his head, his eyes meeting the doctor's.

  "Well, why don't you let me have a look at you first, Pete, then we'll see to Arless." They managed to get him into the office and up onto an examining table, Pete grumbling the whole time. "You all wait out there, and I'll see what I can do for Pete." Doc motioned to the waiting area they'd just come through.

  "You go on and find Owen, Patrick. I'll be fine. If Doc gives me any trouble, I'll just wallop him." Pete grinned and then lay back, closing his eyes.

  "He'll be fine." Doc nodded at them, and then turned to his patient.

  "Come on." Loralee pulled Patrick into the waiting room. "I'll stay here and watch out for him. You need to tell Owen what's going on. Michael and Cara are counting on you."

  Patrick nodded, his gaze meeting hers. "Thank you, Loralee—for everything." There really wasn't anything else to say, or if there was, he hadn't earned the right to say it.

  She smiled up at him, her eyes a little sad. "I think you have it backwards, Patrick." She leaned up and kissed him on the cheek. "It's me who should be thanking you."

  He stood for a moment lost in the soft warmth of her eyes. Then, with a deep breath, he turned to go. No sense thinking of things that couldn't be. He'd covered that territory last night, and nothing had changed. Besides he had a killer to find.

  Patrick walked along the boardwalk, thinking about Amos Striker. It was still hard to believe that Striker had killed his mother and Zach. There was just something about the story that didn't ring true. Oh, Striker was capable of killing people all right. The last few days had more than proven that.

  But something just didn't feel right. For one thing it was a hell of a coincidence that Striker would come across Zach and his mother and the silver by chance. It wasn't impossible, certainly, but it still seemed highly unlikely. The Promise was isolated. High up in the mountains above Clune.

  They'd been real careful not to ever let on where the exact location was. His father hadn't wanted anyone to be able to find it. They'd even filed their claim over in Del Norte, changing details here and there, so that anyone who did manage to find the papers, wouldn't actually be able to find the mine.

  It had been Owen's idea, but Duncan had liked the plan, too. Most likely his father thought the whole thing a grand adventure. It hadn't been wealth that called to his father, it had been excitement. Duncan Macpherson liked living on the edge.

  Patrick frowned, turning his thoughts back to Striker. The sheriff wasn't a bright man, just a devious one, and the elaborate scenario they'd come up with last night, required something more than devious. So either they were dead wrong about Rose and Zach and the silver, or there was someone else involved. Someone who was calling the shots, and using Amos Striker as muscle.

  Or a fall guy.

  Patrick pushed through the swinging doors of the Irish Rose, the cacophony of voices, laughter and tinny piano assaulting his ears. Patrons in various stages of inebriation lined the big mahogany bar and clustered at the tables scattered around the room. Sam was behind the bar, busy with the raucous miners. He raised an arm to Patrick in salute, but his attention was quickly pulled back to patrons demanding more liquor.

  Patrick headed for the back and Owen's office, his mind still puzzling on the problem of Amos Striker. If someone else was behind everything that happened, it had to be someone they knew. Someone who had something to gain by stealing the silver.

  But who the hell could it be?

  "Loralee." Ginny burst through the doctor's door, her dark eyes filled with relief. "Oh, honey, I thought… well there's been all kinds of talk. And when you just up and disappeared…"

  Loralee hugged the older woman, fighting to keep from bursting into tears. "I've been at Clune with Patrick." She pulled away. "Amos Striker tried to kill me."

  "You all right?" The older woman eyed her worriedly.

  "I'm fine. It's Pete that's in trouble. Amos Striker shot him. He followed us to Clune and pinned us in the house. If it hadn't of been for Michael we'd be dead for sure."

  "Michael's alive?"

  "He is, and he brought…" she broke off, not knowing exactly how to explain Cara.

  "Don't matter, you can tell me later. Where's Patrick?" Ginny asked, her dark eyes intense.

  Loralee frowned. "He's gone to find Owen. To tell him what's happened."

  Ginny grabbed her by the shoulders. "You got to find him now. Before he finds Owen."

  "Why? I don't under
stand." She met the older woman's gaze, and something in her eyes made Loralee shiver.

  "Because Owen Prescott's telling folks that Patrick is the one who killed Corabeth. He's the one that sent Amos Striker out to Clune."

  28

  Cara pulled her horse to a stop, her eyes glued to the steep rise of red-brown rock. It was almost as if a giant hand had thrust it up, splintering the earth, shattering its symmetry. The face of the cliff was sheer and inaccessible, ascending a thousand feet straight into the air.

  She sucked in a breath as her eyes found what she was seeking. There, jutting from the craggy stone, about a hundred feet down from the upper rim, a dark blotch against sunlit rock.

  The Promise.

  In her time, it had been nothing more than a gaping hole surrounded by fallen timbers, easily mistaken for shadow. But now, in this time, it was whole, the shoring intact, marking the entrance to what had recently been a working mine. It filled her with a sense of awe. A sobering symbol of man's desire to conquer nature.

  Heavy cables bowed away from rocky walls, extending through the bright spring air, dropping gracefully down to the narrow canyon floor. At the bottom of the gorge, straddling the rushing waters of Shallow Creek was another building, its rough log walls extending into the opposite slope of mountain. It was built on wooden scaffolding with two chutes jutting out of one side. A rutted path ran underneath the structure, paralleling the stream.

  The cables disappeared inside an opening in one side of the building. She frowned, then suddenly smiled as she realized what she was seeing. What appeared to be four cables was actually two. One set going in and the other going out. She was looking at some kind of tram station.

  "Amazing isn't it?" Michael was staring up at the mine, his hands resting on his saddle horn. "I never get tired of seeing it."

  "It's awe-inspiring." She followed his gaze up to the entrance high above them. "How in the world did they get up there?"

  Michael smiled. "You mean we."

  The enormity of it all hit her like a sledge hammer. This mine was Michael's. He'd helped his father find it, build it. "Of course, I meant you—and your father," she added.

  He pointed to the top of the cliff. "There's another entrance up there. That's what you painted. It's where Father first found the vein."

  "So you reach it from the backside of the mountain. But, if that's an easier way in, then why…"

  "I didn't say it was easier." He shifted in his saddle. "The main shaft sinks about 100 feet straight down into the mountain. From there we dug the main tunnel. In addition, there are probably another dozen or so smaller tunnels and drifts."

  "Drifts?" She frowned.

  "Tunnels without a second opening."

  "Dead-ends?" Her knowledge of mining was minimal.

  "Right. There are three levels in the mine, each connected with a shaft. But the main work was done on the first level."

  "And that's the level your dad indicated in his note?"

  "I think so."

  She shaded her eyes with a hand and looked again at the timbers jutting out from the side of the mountain. "So how do we get up there?"

  Again Michael smiled, his eyes crinkling at the corners in a way that made her stomach tighten. "We fly."

  Cara eyed him dubiously. "Beg your pardon?"

  "I said, we fly. Come on, I'll show you."

  They dismounted, and he led them up the incline and through a small door in the building. It took her a minute to adjust to the gloom. The floor was dusty, probably the winter home for a menagerie of animals. One side of the cable hung suspended over their heads, above the plank platform. On the other side, the cable ran across the openings for the two chutes.

  "It's a turning station."

  Cara looked at Michael. "A what?"

  "A turning station. The ore comes down the mountain in one of these cars." He tapped the side of a shallow, rectangular bucket, its handles attached to the cable with what looked like a pulley, the pulley in turn attached to the cable. Several of the cars stood in a row just to the left of the platform. Ready for takeoff no doubt. "Once it gets here, it follows the cable there," he pointed at the wires above the openings in the floor, "And the ore is dumped down the chutes into a waiting wagon."

  "I thought the cables meant a tram of some kind, but I don't see how—"

  He cut her off with the wave of a hand. "It's also used to get supplies," he paused for effect, "and men," he grinned like a mischievous little boy, "up to the mine."

  Understanding washed through her with the force of a tidal wave. "Oh no, I'm not going up there." She pointed through the opening in the opposite wall at the distant mine, then eyed the narrow metal box with something bordering on panic. "In that."

  "It's fun. I've done it a million times and besides it's faster than climbing over the backside of the mountain to the mineshaft."

  She looked up at the cable, trying to judge its strength. When the hell did they invent reinforced steel, anyway? The wire above her head looked strong enough, but when she looked at it climbing up across the gulch, she wasn't as certain. "How exactly do you propose we do that? There isn't an engine."

  Michael laughed. "We don't need one. The thing works with gravity. As a loaded tram car comes down, it pulls the one here back to the top."

  "Well, we've got a problem, then. There's no one up there to fill a car and send it down," she pronounced triumphantly.

  "My father rigged it so that we always leave a full one at the top."

  "Great." She blew out a breath and tried to look enthusiastic. "Of course," she added, "it has been a while since you were up here, and between your dad and Amos Striker there's every chance the loaded car has been used and not replaced." She tried to keep the pleading note out of her voice, but she had absolutely no desire to emulate Peter Pan.

  Michael turned his back, examining a gizmo that ran out of a window on one side of the door. "Of course we do have a back-up system."

  "Oh?" A sense of inevitability hit her.

  "Yeah, there's a horse winch, too."

  "A horse winch?" She knew she sounded like a parrot.

  "Yeah." He gestured out the window. "It's out there. Sort of a horse drawn pulley."

  She schooled her features into what she hoped was her calm, sensible look. "But the horses are tired."

  Michael actually laughed. "Don't worry, sweetheart, I'm fairly certain we won't need the horses."

  She frowned at him and turned away, walking to the far edge of the platform. The opening here was large, almost the entire side of the building. And what little wallboard there was looked like it would disintegrate with a small tap. The first ore bucket in line sat only a few feet from the edge, ready to leap out into the air.

  Her stomach dropped. The whole thing reminded her of a rinky-dink version of the aerial tram at Disney World, and she'd refused to ride it, too.

  She looked down at the rushing water. The noise from the stream below was deafening. Perfect white noise. She grinned, thinking of how much people paid to emulate a sound like that. "I…go…ng…ut...ide." She swung around to look at Michael. His mouth was moving, but she couldn't understand the words. She pointed at her ear.

  He, in turn, pointed at the door. "I'm going outside for a minute," he yelled.

  She signaled 'okay' and then wondered if he even knew what it meant. Shrugging, she turned back to the view from the open wall. It was magnificent. She looked down again. Compared to the top of the run, they were fairly close to the ground here. Probably only a couple hundred feet or so, but the rocks below looked deadly and the rushing stream did nothing to alleviate her fears.

  She'd just have to tell him she couldn't do it. Simple as that. Behind her the door banged. "Michael." She turned around ready to confess. The words died on her lips.

  The man in the doorway wasn't Michael. But she knew who he was—his resemblance to Nick was uncanny. Fear danced its way along her spine.

  Amos Striker.

  A slow
delighted smile spread across his face. "Well, well, what do we have here." He took a step toward her and she took a step back. He took another step and she immediately moved back again, as if they were locked into some kind of macabre dance. He moved forward again, this time into a pool of light coming from the opening behind her. Her eyes still locked on him, she realized it was her move. She opened her mouth, but nothing came out.

  "Cat got your tongue?"

  She licked her lips and stepped back, only to realize she'd run out of floor.

  Amos's mustache thinned as his smile grew broader. "And just where do you think you're going, darlin'?" he drawled.

  She felt the skin on the back of her neck crawl. She slid sideways behind the last tram car. She could feel the wind through the opening at her back, but even so, she felt more secure with the hunk of metal between her and the sheriff.

  "Come here, angel." He gestured with a finger. "I won't hurt you."

  Like hell. How stupid did he think she was? Stupid enough to wind up alone in the middle of another century with a murderer, her mind suggested. She watched as he took another step toward her. Help. She needed help. She opened her mouth, praying for a voice. "Michael?" Her call came out a muted squeak.

  Amos was at the edge of the ore bucket now. She inched back until her heels rocked out over the edge of the platform. Startled, she reached for the ore car, gripping the edge with both hands.

  "I wouldn't bother calling him, darlin'. I think he's past hearing you." He patted a Colt stuck in the waist of his pants.

  Michael's gun.

  She sucked in a ragged breath, and shoved hard against the bucket, but it didn't move.

  Amos laughed. "Only goes one way, I'm afraid, and it'd be a shame to see a gal as pretty as you go over the edge." He nudged the bucket with his knee and it lurched forward, resting against her legs. Then, with a booted foot, he rocked it slowly, so that it rubbed provocatively against her. "Think of that as a little warm up, darlin'." His mouth still curled into a smile, but his eyes were like shards of ice. She felt their frigid touch as his gaze moved down her body.