HT02 - Sing: A Novel of Colorado (39 page)

“I made my excuses to Bryce in order to catch a moment with you,” he said. “I want to apologize again—”

“No. We’ve been through it. Now we just have to get past it. It was a weak moment, for both of us. I should’ve never invited you on that ride and—”

“No, Dess. You should’ve been able to invite me without a second thought.” He turned away from her and ran his hand through his hair. His face was awash with pain as he looked over his shoulder at her. “I’m your brother-in-law. You should be able to trust me.” He shook his head as if disgusted with himself.

As angry as she was, Odessa didn’t want him to leave still punishing himself, berating himself for years to come. “It’s over,” she said softly, moving forward to stand beside him at the boardwalk rail. “You’ll return to Maine and find yourself a lovely wife, and we’ll laugh about this when we’re old.”

He glanced at her, a measure of hope in his eyes. “Think so? Someday we’ll laugh about it?”

“My father always said that time gives all things perspective. So yes, I’m confident we will.”

They stood, side by side for a while. Robert cleared his throat and said, “Will you tell Bryce what I did?”

She considered his question for a minute, then said, “I don’t know, Robert. Bryce and I strive to hold few secrets from each other. But this … I do not wish to harm your relationship. And if it never happens again—”

He turned to her and smiled, the hope now wild in his eyes. He shook his head. “It won’t. Never again. I crossed the line. Forevermore, I’ll be the most trustworthy gentleman in the room with you. I don’t wish to risk my relationship with either of you or to not know Samuel as he grows up. Bryce would … And this …” He paused and sighed, staring at her. “Bryce would cut me off from you—from you all—forever. I couldn’t bear that.”

She studied him. “Go home, Robert. Do find yourself a good woman, someone who can give you the love you seek. Have a family. Then this, me, all of it will be behind you.”

He nodded and smiled. “Because of all my time at sea, I’d thought I shouldn’t marry. But maybe you’re right. Maybe a good woman will cure what ails me.”

She smiled back at him. “You’d be surprised.”

He hesitated.

“Robert,” she said, seeing him not as the man who had tried to steal a kiss but rather the man who had taken care of her baby in the depths of night. “Please. I’ve heard your words. Give me some time to remember them in my heart. You have done much good for us here. You’re doing good by us, organizing the auction, seeing the men off on their voyage … it will be all right in time.”

He gave her a half smile, twisted his hat in his hands one more time, and then set it on his head. “Until next time then.”

“Until then,” she said.

Chapter 24

Sheriff Chambers circled around and brought Daniel up short. Both were astride horses. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“After them,” Daniel said. He paused and looked up to the sky. It was after noon; daylight was burning. And he had not one bit of strength to spend on anything but finding Moira.

“Daniel, you’re wounded. Leave this to us.”

“I would, but a promise is a promise.” To Gavin.
I’ll protect her.
To Moira.
You won’t be alone.

“I say, when a man suffers a gunshot wound, he gets a little leeway in fulfilling his promises,” the sheriff said as one of his deputies rode up beside Daniel. Behind him, a snow-covered mountain range met a deep blue sky.

“If I couldn’t move, I’d agree with you, Sheriff,” Daniel allowed. “But as you can see, I’m getting along fine.”

“Fine until you keel over from blood loss. Come now, Daniel, come back to the doctor’s. We’ll set out after Moira Colorado and Bannock at first light.”

“At first light?” Daniel said in disbelief. “Look! We have half the day left. The trail will be cold come morning. We start now or I go it alone.” He studied the sheriff. Did the man think he had imagined it all? Bannock stealing off with Moira? Or had Bannock paid him off, foreseeing a possible chase? Considering her injuries, Moira couldn’t be traveling fast, not if Bannock hoped to keep her alive. “Get out of my way, Sheriff.”

The sheriff swore under his breath. “You don’t know who you’re dealing with, Daniel. I did some checking on Bannock. He goes back with those folks near Westcliffe. He killed one of their ranch hands.” He shook his head. “Not to mention the detective the St. Clairs hired.”

Daniel’s eyes narrowed.

“There’s something big transpiring here, something bigger than us. We need a posse to go after them. Bannock was seen riding out with three men and Moira. He might be meeting up with more. We’re not going after him—two of us and you, half-baked.”

“I’m going after them now, Sheriff. Now I’ll tell you again. Get out of my way.” His horse shied left, antsy because of the men’s raised voices.

The sheriff shook his head. “I’ve got my hands full here, man. Two dead from the opera house—”

“And a kidnapping victim, three steps farther away every moment we sit here, yammering on!” Daniel cried.

“I’ll get a posse together. We’ll set out in a couple hours.”

“And I’ll be a couple hours ahead of you,” Daniel ground out.

They were again on the move, every step an agonizing experience. Moira was atop a pack mule, which was tethered to Reid’s horse ahead of her. She moaned with each footfall, despite her most fervent desire to keep from it. But when the donkey stumbled a bit and she lurched forward, every nerve ending in her burned body from ankle to scalp erupted in pain, making her cry out.

Reid pulled up and circled around. “Moira, really. Cease your dramatics.”

She stared at him, aghast at his cruelty.

“Or do I need to gag you?”

She shook her head. “Does your hatred run so deep?”

“Deeper than you can imagine,” he said lowly. “You stole my heart. Your sister and brother-in-law stole the O’Toole mine from me. Stole four years of my life. You will all pay for those injustices.”

Moira groaned. Her stomach roiled, and her skin was a throbbing mass of pain. But she had to know what would end this journey, what he was ultimately after. “They can’t give you what they don’t have. The mine is nonexistent.”

“There is something else that has been discovered in the meantime, the true treasure of which Sam spoke. I believe, Moira, that your sister knows the way to a hidden cave full of conquistador gold.”

“You’re mad,” Moira said, shaking her head. “Unwell. You think Odessa would allow a stash of gold to sit out there, ready for anyone to pluck? If they’ve found it, it’s in the Westcliffe Bank.”

A rider came out of the shadows. “Boss, we have to keep moving. They can’t be far behind us.”

“So that is it?” Moira pressed. “Your price to end all this is the deed to the O’Toole mine or the conquistador gold?”

“I’m only interested in the gold now. I can’t remain in the States after I accomplish this. I need portable wealth as payment. Be it gold or cash, the McAllans will pay.”

“But what if they give you neither?”

Reid turned in his saddle to glance at her. “Then they’ll pay me with their lives.”

Nic managed to avoid Alejandro for a while. He decided the captain had seen the tension brewing between the men and purposefully set them on separate shifts, in separate areas of the ship, day and night. Even when he wearily dropped into his hammock at night, Alejandro’s, six nets down, remained empty. He dropped off to sleep, dreaming that Alejandro had fallen overboard and no one thought to look for him. He even began to feel a little sorry for the man, adrift at sea, calling, pleading for help, until the ship faded into the horizon.

But Manuel was more difficult. With the winds at dead calm, the ship was on pure steam power for three days straight. Manuel said nothing to Nic or the other seamen; he only brought in the bins of coal that rode along tracks from the stern hold and dumped them for each digger, grunting a brief greeting to each man. Nic never saw him without a cigar in his mouth; sometimes it was lit, most of the time it wasn’t. He tensed under the bright gaze of the coal boss, expecting another sermon that he could not escape as he worked, but the man remained silent.

Until the fourth day. Nic finished the last of his pile of coal, placed his shovel upon the rack, and went outside. The two others still had half a pile each to shovel into the stove. Manuel followed him out and dropped the half barrel off the side of the ship to haul in some seawater. They stood, side by side, at the edge, watching it drag a moment. “You think about what I said to you?” Manuel asked him.

“About California?” Nic said, feigning forgetfulness.

“About God.”

“Oh, yes. I thought about it.”

“Good, good.” Manuel moved the cigar to the other side of his mouth and hauled up the barrel from the ocean. He was burly, and the barrel swung on its rope above them within a minute. Manuel stopped its swing as Nic positioned himself under it. He was shirtless, but he kept his pants on—it was the only opportunity to get them somewhat clean—but he didn’t know why he bothered; the coal dust seemed to stick to everything.

“It doesn’t matter what you’ve done, Dominic. God can wash you clean.”

Before Nic could respond, the coal boss dumped the cold water over his head, a steady rush of water that drenched him from head to toe. Nic sputtered and rubbed his eyes. He grimaced at the coal boss. “What if I don’t want Him to?”

Manuel shrugged, and his eyes sparkled with a held-back smile. “Then He won’t. He waits for us to ask it of Him.” He pulled the cigar out of his mouth and gestured toward Nic with it. “But mark my words, God will chase you until the end of your life. Better to give in to Him sooner than later. Until then, you will have no rest.”

He moved over to the freshwater barrels and dipped a smaller bucket into it. Nic took a coal-darkened cake of soap from a ledge and quickly lathered his hair and torso and arms with it. He doubted his fingernails would ever have a merchant’s look about them again, between his fighting and sailing and now digging in the black. He refused to meet Manuel’s gaze, not wishing the man to see it as an invitation for further conversation.

But Manuel paused beside him, holding the bucket of water at shoulder height. “Why do you resist Him, Dominic?”

Nic let out a scoffing laugh. “You mean God?”

“Yes, I mean God.”

“I’ll tell you why,” he spit out, pointing a threatening finger at Manuel. Manuel seemed unperturbed. “Your God took my little brothers, one at a time. He let them suffocate from the consumption. Four of them,” he said, shaking four of his fingers in the man’s face. “Four. They were young, innocent. My youngest brother … he was three! What kind of God allows
that?”

Manuel’s face grew grim. “A God who wept beside you. A God who does not like death, and gave His own Son so that we might know life forever.”

Nic let out another scoffing sound. “And was it
that
God that took my mother in childbirth? And the baby my mother carried? Don’t tell me your God isn’t about death.”

Manuel let the bucket drop a little. He looked so sad that Nic was suddenly alarmed that he might cry. It made him want to hit the man, strike him. Nic wanted nothing to do with sorrow, especially on his behalf. He waved at the bucket with a shaking hand. “Get on with it,” he snapped.