Deep Trouble (5 page)

It was very dark except for the crackling fire. And even that was dying down.

She heard Gabe more than saw him lean closer. The fire might even have revealed a gleam in his eye. Was it the same thing that had overcome her expedition so that they robbed her and left her for dead? Greed? Gold fever? A thirst for wealth?

She wanted to shout at him. Beat on him. Tell him he was failing her. Tell him he was supposed to be better than the people who had hurt her.

“Is this rock pile one of them?”

Tell him he was a sarcastic idiot.

“I’ve got the notes he left and the words he spoke. I used what he told me to break the code of his maps and writing, and now I’ve discovered what he found.”

Gabe sighed so long and deep he sounded like the wind blowing past their meager shelter.

“This place was one of the destinations. I knew it was special, and because of that, I hoped it was one of the golden cities. But Father talked of treasure, and he was a history scholar. He would consider these caves a treasure. Now that I’ve seen it, I understand why Father was so fascinated. But there was another place he told me to go. Another destination on the map.”

“I’ve wandered the West a lot, Shannon.” He sounded very kind, which probably meant he pitied her. Thought she was delusional. “There aren’t any cities of gold. I’m really sorry, but there just aren’t.”

“Did you know this place was here?”

“No.”

“Well, then why couldn’t there be another city somewhere? The bishops would have taken pains to hide because they’d run away with so much wealth.”

“How many ships did you say they took? Because it’d take a lot of ships to carry enough gold to build even a real small town—”

She cut him off, “They’d build the city in a hidden canyon, on a mountaintop, or in a secluded valley sheltered by a vast woodland. Why not?”

“Okay, I suppose a city could be hidden out here somewhere. Doubt it.”

“Well, I don’t.”

“But that still doesn’t explain why you were stuck up in that cave.”

“The people I hired to travel with me stole my maps and left me stranded.”

“Oh.” Gabe nodded. “Guess that explains it. You should’ve said that about two hours ago. Saved some time.”

“And I’ll prove I’m right about the lost city of gold just as soon as I can get back to a town where I can buy a horse, hire more people to scout the land for me, and head for the next place on the map.”

“Hire more help? Didn’t you say it was your hired help who stranded you in that cave?”

There was no possible way to deny it. “Yes. Three men and two women were with my expedition.”

“And you’re going to trust yourself to hire more? ‘Cuz no offense ‘r nuthin’…”

“Why am I suddenly bracing myself to be deeply offended?”

“But you’re not that good at picking hands.”

Shannon wanted to slug him, but now wasn’t the time or place. “Yes, I picked poorly that once.”

“Real poorly. Awful.” Gabe shuddered.

Right here in front of her was an utterly trustworthy man. Gabe. “What do you do for a living?”

“Why don’t you go home?” He ignored her question, but that might be because he was busy telling her how to live her life. “Where did you say you came from?”

“My mother lives in St. Louis. But that’s not my home anymore. She’s very unhappy with me for taking this journey.”

“Sounds like a wise woman.”

“No, she’s not! She’s a wealthy snob who has looked down on my father and his work for years.” Gabe had finally said something she couldn’t just brush aside. “She’s more interested in her high society connections and the cut of her overpriced gowns than she is in her own husband or her daughter. I will
not
go happily on my way while my father’s life’s work is subjected to scorn. My father died trying to bring education to people. His colleagues think he had gold fever, but he was not searching for gold. He was searching for knowledge. He wanted to find the history of this country. He wanted to prove America had inhabitants and old ruins just like ancient Greece. He asked me to find this place, and if I can’t prove he found it, then he died for nothing! He left me for nothing!”

Gabe was silent, thank the good Lord.

It would be like him to comment in some stupid way right now that would not help at all.

“Your father did leave you something. He loved you. He left you knowing that. No parent can do better for a child than to let her know she is loved.”

That actually helped a little. It would help even more if Shannon could be sure her father cared more for her than he did for gold. “He did love me.” Shannon wondered if saying it out loud made it true. “In the end my mother no longer believed that, but I did. She said all he cared about was gold, but he was already rich. Why would he need more money?”

“Instead, he wanted respect.”

“Yes.”

“Honor from other teachers at his college.”

“Professors, not teachers.”

“He wanted to put his name on a discovery for the ages, like Christopher Columbus discovering America or Lewis and Clark mapping the West.”

“Yes, that’s all he wanted.”

“So he didn’t leave you for gold.”

“Absolutely not.”

“He left you for pride.”

“Yes, that’s exactly—” Shannon stopped herself. “What?”

“I’m very sorry about your pa dying, Shannon, before he could find what it was he was searching for. If you’re planning to spend your whole life searching for a lost city of gold, do everyone a favor and don’t get married and have a husband and children to abandon.”

Shannon’s throat felt swollen, and she couldn’t speak.

“Let’s get to sleep.”

Gabe’s suggestion distracted her so she didn’t start crying. She gathered her self-control and responded in a hoarse voice. “Yes, it’s been a long day. A terrible day.” She looked at him, sitting almost shoulder to shoulder with her, the glowing embers casting his face in a red light.

Earlier today he’d saved her life. Just now, he’d broken her heart.

Or maybe Gabe just shined a light so she could see that her father had broken her heart.

“Be careful climbing up there.” He gave her a pat that was supposed to be encouraging. “Those ledges aren’t safe.”

“Me? I’m not sleeping in that cave.
You’re
sleeping in that cave.” That distracted her even further from her hurt. She preferred to be distracted.

“No, you’re going up. I need to stay down here.”

“Why?”

There was a moment of silence. “Because it’s the man’s job to… to…”

“To make the woman scale the cliff while he stays safely on the ground?”

“Is that a trick question?”

“Fine, whatever you say. I’ll sleep in that spooky, dark, empty, possibly haunted cave.”

“I don’t believe in ghosts, so it’s not haunted. The rest is sure enough right.”

She thought maybe she heard a squelched laugh.

“Humph.” She turned with all the dignity she possessed, which at this point was almost none, and took two firm steps toward the cliff.

“And I’ll stay down here with the rattlesnakes, scorpions, and cougars.” Gabe’s voice followed her. “And I’ll be ready in case the five armed outlaws who left you to die a lingering death of hunger and thirst come back.”

When he put it like that, maybe being down here wasn’t a big improvement over the cave.

“I need to be down here between you and danger, Shannon. Surely you can see that.”

“I know.” She should stay down here with him. Two of them to face down five armed outlaws. But she knew they wouldn’t come back; she hoped very much they were busy following her map, which wouldn’t make enough sense to ever inform them that they hadn’t gotten everything they were looking for. That thought reminded Shannon that she’d never fully shared her great idea with Gabe.

She turned back to him. Her two steps had actually brought her face-to-face with him. The fire crackled, and the night breeze blew cold. She felt that wimpy sense of being rescued again.

To drive back the terror of the nonexistent ghosts who did
not
haunt that cave, Shannon threw herself into his arms again. Surely a woman ought to be able to rescue herself. She thought of that high cave where she’d been left to die slowly and knew she’d lived only because of Gabe. “Thank you.”

His arms came around her, and they were so strong. He had literally held her with those arms on this side of the pearly gates.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

The embrace went on for far too long. It kept the cold of the night at bay.

Shannon dreaded leaving him. She wasn’t sure she could. So, when her head cleared enough to think, she stepped out of his arms—not very far out, but it was the best she could do—and decided to delay bedtime for a few more minutes. “What did you say you do for a living again, Gabe?”

“I’m a rancher.”

That meant he was very busy. “Are we on your land?”

“Nope, my ranch is up north, near Ranger Bluffs, in Wyoming.”

“Why aren’t you there?” Perhaps he
was
a man with some spare time.

Shrugging, Gabe looked down at his boots as if they were fascinating. “I’ve been traveling. I’ve just started up ranching and only had a few head of cattle. I turned them over to a neighbor because I wanted to see my brothers before I settled in, half a country away from most of ‘em. I figured to spend the summer with my brother in New Mexico. And see a couple of others in Texas. I thought to spend the winter with one or the other of ‘em.”

Definitely some spare time. She ran her hand down her thigh to feel the slightly thickened spot in her skirt where she concealed her remaining maps. They’d taken her notes and the maps that had led them to these cliff dwellings, but they didn’t have the one that led to the next city. The one that was going to be made of gold. “Thank you for saving me today, Gabe.”

“You’re welcome. No decent man would’ve done nuthin’ else. Good night, Shannon. I’m glad I came riding along when I did.”

“So am I.” She opened her mouth to ask him, beg him to help her. And found she couldn’t do it, not when he’d just held her so close. She couldn’t bear another dose of his sarcasm. “Good night, Gabe.”

T
his isn’t the right map.” Lurene Lester jerked her head up from reading the papers they’d taken from that fool of a woman this afternoon. She lurched to her feet and whirled to face Ginger. “You told me you searched her.”

“I did.” Ginger reached for the papers Lurene held.

Lobo got there first, grabbed the papers out of Ginger’s hand, and shoved her aside with one of his massive hands. “You’re saying we don’t have the map?”

“What difference does it make?” Darrel Lloyd kicked at the dirt between the fire and where he’d lolled since they’d finished setting up camp. “You saw what she led us to today. Dirt and rock. The next map is gonna lead to the same kinda place if it leads anywhere at all.”

Lurene had all she could handle not to wrap her fingers around the man’s dirty neck. “That map she had led us to those caves today. It wasn’t gold, but you can see it was deserted. Whoever lived there had strange ways. I can believe they carried gold into that secretive place and kept it hidden. Those people took it with them when they moved on. The next step on her map was gonna lead us somewhere. Maybe to where those folks went who built the caves.”

“Their new home and their gold.” Ginger rubbed her hands together.

Lurene liked to see the greed on the woman’s face. It kept her in line.

“Lobo, you’ve lived in this area for years. You ever seen anything like those caves before?”

“Nope.” Lobo looked up from the papers. “This don’t mean nothin’ to me. This is all squiggly lines and initials.”

“A code.” Lurene poured herself more coffee and wished everyone would shut up so she could think, but she didn’t really need to think. There was only one thing they could do. “We’ve got to go back.”

“To those caves?” Darrel shifted and turned away from the fire to stare into the night. “I didn’t like that place. It felt haunted.”

Lurene hadn’t liked it a bit either. She didn’t admit that, because what would be the point? “I’m going back. If you searched her thoroughly, Ginger…”

“I did.” Ginger jumped to her feet and started pacing. She always had trouble being still. Her red hair, wild frizzing curls, flashed in the fire when she came close then turned dull when she walked into the darkness.
All the motion oughta keep the rattlesnakes away
. And if it didn’t, they’d get Ginger first.

“Then she must have stashed it somewhere,” Lobo said.

“Wait a minute. Did anyone check her saddlebags?” Lurene whirled to face the bags, still hanging from the back of Darrel’s saddle, where it had been thrown when they’d bedded down for the night.

“I never saw her take nuthin’ out of there except food and clothes,” Darrel said. “And I was watchin’ for when that map would show up in her hands. She’d usually go off alone then come back. She didn’t take her saddlebags with her. Figured it was in a pocket.”

“Let’s see if she’s got anything else in there.” Lurene strode to the bags and flipped one open. “Supplies,” she muttered as she pulled the contents out, tossing things aside. She reached the bottom of the bag and almost gave up. Then her hand hit a ridge in the bottom that had her poking her head down to look. She ran her fingers along that ridge and realized it wasn’t the bottom. It was a flat leather folder almost the exact width and length of the saddlebag. She pulled it out. “It’s heavy.”

Fumbling it, it spilled and rained gold. The metallic clinking and the flash in the firelight drew the rest of her companions like that gold was a bright light in the darkness.

And they were a swarm of bugs.

“Lots of money,” Ginger said, dropping to her knees to claw at the coins. “Fifty- and twenty-dollar gold pieces.”

Cutter knocked her hand aside. “We split this even. Five ways.”

Lurene didn’t feel much like sharing the coins, and she thought, not for the first time, that she didn’t want to share any city of gold either. She wondered who she’d pick to die first. She looked to make sure the wallet was empty and saw a paper.
The map maybe?
Her heart pounded as she pulled it out. “What’s this?”

She unfolded it and saw a name she recognized, John Jacob Astor. The words were printed an inch high in fancy swirling letters across the top of the sheet of paper. Below that, a letter began:

Dear Shannon
,

Lurene didn’t read the letter. That would take some doing. Reading wasn’t her strong suit. So she slid her eyes down and saw it was signed:

Affectionately,
Your Cousin John Astor

Below the signature, it read in slightly smaller but no less elegant script than on the top, John Jacob Astor IV.

“John Jacob Astor is her cousin?” Lurene raised her eyes. Everyone in the West had heard of the people who owned most of the land under New York City.

Those words were printed on the paper, engraved just like the top. As if this man was so rich and important he hired others to print up lots of sheets of paper like this. No doubt his time was occupied spending his millions.

Lurene looked at Cutter then shifted her gaze to look at Randy. She could tell the kid was thinking.

“I’ll count the money out by the fire. All of us watching.” Lurene could get it back out of their saddlebags later… when they were dead. “Watch me pick it up so you’ll know I’m not holding out on you.”

Cutter jerked his chin in agreement. Randy watched her as if she were holding a shooting iron aimed right at his heart.

She sat down by the fire with her shirt turned into a pouch to hold the coins. She made neat piles in front of her. When she was done counting, there was over five hundred dollars. “We each get a hundred dollars, with about fifty dollars more in small coins.”

Lurene looked up at the starving hunger in her band of outlaws. Lurene had never had a hundred dollars in her hand at once, let alone five hundred. She could live for two years if she was careful on a hundred. Forever on five.

But the money wasn’t what really hit her. “She’s rich. Did any of you pick up on Shannon Dysart being rich?”

Cutter shrugged. “She didn’t flash a lot of money around. She didn’t buy a high-stepping horse or wear silk clothes. She offered me fair pay but no fortune. And she could’ve paid more, too.” His displeasure was clear, though it was laughable considering the way they’d treated Shannon. They’d been worth a whole lot less than she’d paid.

“If she’s really rich,” Randy said, holding his share of the coins so the fire sparkled on them, “we ought to go get her out of that cave. She talked about her pa enough that we know he’s dead, but she’s probably got other people, folks who’d pay to get her back.”

Ransom
.

Lurene could feel the rain of money showering her clean right now. “And I know she’s got another map. She’d let me look at it sometimes and talk to me about it, how she’d broken the code. She never told me
how
she’d broken it, but I watched her work on the map that led us to those caves, and I figured out what she was doing. But I never saw her carrying it during the day. She’d set the next day’s course. Then, when she got up the next morning, we’d let her lead the way. I figured it to be in her satchel, but maybe, once we got to those caves, she hid it, buried it, or stuck it behind some rocks. We’ve got to go back there and get it from her.”

“She won’t tell us where she hid it. Not after what we done to her.” Randy Lloyd was a quiet one. Not as given to talk as his big brother, Darrel. But he was always thinking. Lurene knew it about the man because she saw in him the same thing she saw in herself. A planner. Someone who thought everything through before he acted. But Randy struck Lurene as none too bright. So all his thinking probably wouldn’t lead to much.

“She
will
tell us if she wants to come down from that cave.”

“But she won’t believe we’re gonna let her live. Why would she?” Randy met Lurene’s eyes. Not belligerent. He seemed to really want to know what she had planned.

“We’ll let her down, and then we’ll get the truth out of her.”

“How?”

“Most women have their limits.” Lurene laughed when she thought of it. She’d had men push her past her limits many times. But these days there wasn’t much Lurene wouldn’t accept. Shannon, though, she’d be easy to scare.

“I think we can hunt around until we find what’ll shake the truth loose from Miss Rich Lady Dysart.” Lurene liked having a chance to hurt the city girl who thought she could buy loyalty with cash money. The little woman had been a fool from the start, and there was no reason to doubt she’d die a fool. It had suited Lurene to leave the woman to die alone. But if fancy Miss Shannon wanted to speed things up, Lurene would be glad to help.

“We’ll tell her about the ransom and make her believe we have to return her alive to collect,” Ginger said. “And while we wait for her folks back east to pay up, we’ll hunt for gold.”

“I don’t know much about kidnapping,” Randy said. “But it’s a sure bet that we’ll have a better chance of finding gold from Shannon’s family than we will from her stupid map.”

Lurene didn’t want to admit that.

“I know one thing,” Cutter said. “I talked only with her in St. Louis. She didn’t have some fancy crowd around her, smoothing out the details. She set out on this journey on her own. Probably against her family’s wishes.”

“You think they won’t pay ‘cuz of that?” Ginger asked.

“No.” Cutter smirked. “I think they’ll expect trouble because of that. They’ll half expect she’ll end up needing to be rescued. And paying a bunch of money won’t be a big surprise. Those rich folks like to buy their way out of everything. I think all five of us can come out of this rich, with or without a city of gold.”

“I like the sound of that real well.” Ginger smiled a hungry smile.

“And we need to stick together,” Cutter added. “It’ll get real complicated picking up the money and keeping her hidden. It’ll take all five of us to run this kidnapping right.”

Lurene wasn’t sure if Cutter was subtly telling her to give up on her idea of thinning out the number of hands reaching into the pot. She hadn’t told him she was planning it, but Cutter was a sharp one. He’d know what she had on her mind. Or was he trying to give the Lloyd brothers a good reason to stick with them and not get greedy?

“It’s too dark to ride tonight.” Cutter had set the pace after they’d finished with the caves, putting as many miles between them and their crime as he could. They’d ridden through rough land, up and down narrow trails. There was no way to retrace their steps in the dark.

“Shouldn’t we try and get back there?” Ginger asked. “How bad was she hurt when you left her? No chance’a her dying is there?”

“She’ll live.” Lurene had a cold idea that she was fond of. “I wonder what her family would pay for a dead body?”

“Well, it don’t matter, because we won’t ask them to pay for a dead body,” Randy said. “We’ll ask them to pay for her alive, even if she ain’t.”

A shiver of pleasure raced down Lurene’s spine. She really couldn’t help liking how Randy’s mind worked.

“Let her spend a cold night in that cave. It’ll make her more agreeable tomorrow. Let’s turn in and get an early start.” Cutter shoved the worthless papers Shannon had given them at Ginger as she walked close to him, then went to his bedroll and turned his back to the fire.

A dangerous man, Lobo Cutter. Of them all, Lobo was the one who worried Lurene the most. She could handle the rest of them, right down to putting a knife between their ribs. But Lobo was a savvy, trail-hardened outlaw, and he’d be a hard man to best. If she let any of them live, it might be Lobo, just because taking him on might cost her too much. Anyway, Cutter had gotten her into this and taken her off the streets. So she owed him. And she’d pay, until it didn’t suit her anymore.

A quick look at Randy Lloyd reminded her not to underestimate him. He was proving to be smart, and she could use that in a kidnapping. It was a little different than anything she’d tried before.

Shivering in the cold night air of the desert, she crawled into her bedroll and almost asked Cutter to share hers. It wouldn’t be the first time. Cutter had been one of her regulars back in St. Louis. They’d played it quiet about their past for Shannon’s sake. And now Lurene wasn’t sure she wanted Ginger and the Lloyd brothers to know of her connection to Cutter. It might arouse suspicion, especially in Randy, if he figured them for a team. After all, it aroused
her
suspicion thinking of the Lloyd brothers backing each other.

For now, she’d sleep alone in her cold bed. It reminded her too much of her cold nights on the streets back east. She wanted a whiskey to help her forget the ugliness of the life she’d been reduced to. Enough gold and she could put that life far in her past.

Shannon Dysart was the key to cash money and a city of gold.

Lurene thought that if she had a whole city full, it might be enough to make her feel safe and clean.