Over the Edge (29 page)

Something down there called to him. The part of himself he’d left behind. He wondered if it was his soul, if he’d sold it in exchange for survival. “I’ll come back and look.”

“What?” Ethan asked.

Seth turned to his brother. “Nothing. Let’s go find where Rafe ran off to.”

Seth remembered it all. How he’d thought he was in Hades. How he thought Rafe had run away from eternal fire. How Ethan had taken that one small step back in fear. How Seth had felt that crazed bond with the cavern, as if he’d left part of himself behind.

“We went after Rafe and found him coming back for us. He’d strung together the lassoes from our horses, hoping he had enough to reach me.”

“Why didn’t he just stay and help you climb out?” Callie asked.

“With it all on fire, he said he couldn’t see a way down. So he went for a rope and a lantern instead. He’s a man of action, my big brother.”

“And you just rode home, with no trouble?”

“It was like I didn’t even hurt for a while. I remember leaving that cave. They made me go first, afraid they’d need to catch me. But I just climbed right out, mounted up onto my horse, and headed out. Rafe told me later that I passed out and fell off my horse a little ways from home. Ethan ran for help because they were afraid to touch me, all burned up like I was. Pa had come home. He carried me into the house. I don’t remember much after that. I got a real bad fever. Then the nightmares started coming. I tossed and turned in bed, which made it hard for my burns to heal.” Seth turned to look at his wife. “I didn’t have the nightmares so much after a while. But by the time I was out of bed, Ma had started sleeping most of the day.”

“That’s not your fault. You needed her and she failed you.”

Seth kissed her quiet. “And Pa was gone off trapping more than ever. He didn’t really live with us anymore. I guess we know now where he went, huh?”

“Your pa failed you, too. You were just a boy. You couldn’t help the nightmares. At least Rafe and Ethan were tough enough to stick with you.”

“They didn’t, though. Not really. Rafe was so watchful, and he blamed himself. He seemed to grow up overnight. I didn’t have a big brother anymore. I had a very young father. And Ethan . . .” Seth shook his head. “Ethan saved me. He goaded me into showing some backbone and climbing up that rock wall. But he said he’d been too hard on me when I’d been hurt so bad. It was like something broke inside him. No matter how bad things got with Ma sick and Pa gone and me climbing down in that cavern every chance I got, he never did nuthin’ but smile.”

“You went back down?” Callie stretched her arm around his shoulders and rubbed his back, her fingers caressing the ugly scars as if they didn’t repulse her.

“I swear I could hear the cavern calling to me. I still hear it sometimes. I’d lay awake and hear it whisper, speak to me. On the nights that happened, I’d have the worst nightmares. I always thought if I could just go down in the cavern, I’d sleep all right. But Rafe watched too close for me to sneak out in the night.”

“Is that what happened the night you left me?” Callie lifted herself away from him and he suddenly felt cold. But she didn’t leave the bed. Instead, she propped herself up with one elbow, and Seth could see her ink-black hair in the first light of dawn.

Dear God, thank you for this woman.

An ache in his chest grew and spread as he thought of his good fortune. He had the most beautiful woman in the world for his very own wife. He had a strapping son who seemed to love him, even when he’d abandoned the little guy.

He remembered being on fire, thinking he’d gone to where the devil lives, and thinking he deserved it for his reckless ways. And now God had blessed him by giving him Callie. By giving him a family. He was blessed in so many ways.

Seth closed the distance between them, and this time he was thinking clearly and didn’t ask for more than a simple kiss.

She came willingly into his arms.

And he did his best to let her know just how wonderful she was.

Chapter
27

Callie woke up alone.

The panic struck before she was fully awake. She was dressed and running out of the bedroom before she gave her actions a rational thought.

It was full daylight. The cabin was empty. A quick glance in the other bedrooms told her Connor and Heath were gone.

Her whole family had abandoned her!

She flung open the door and rushed outside in her bare feet to hear an axe sing in the woods, not that far away. She could have heard it inside if she’d taken a second to think.

Heath came from the chopping block with an armload of kindling, carrying Connor on his back.

“Reckon you were tired after Seth’s nightmares.” Heath slipped past Callie into the house. As he passed, Connor flashed a huge smile at Callie and waved wildly as they went in. Heath added over his shoulder, “Feet cold?”

Callie looked down and flexed her toes. “They most certainly are.”

Trying her best to be calm, Callie followed Heath inside. “Where’s Seth?”

Heath shrugged. “He rode off this morning early. I just caught sight of him through the window. Didn’t talk to him.”

Fighting down the urge to sprint for the barn and saddle up a horse to hunt her husband down, Callie stiffened her backbone as she watched Heath dump kindling into the woodbox.

“Have you eaten?”

“I had some jerky.” Heath acted like it wasn’t important, but Callie thought she saw a flash of hunger in his eyes. After all, he was a growing boy. “Connor ate, too.”

She spent a few minutes dressing properly and getting a dry diaper on Connor, then let him crawl on the floor while she started breakfast. Heath helped get a hearty meal on. Hunger made a child cooperative, Callie decided.

She put a lot of energy into the cooking to keep from jumping out of her skin and was just washing up when she heard the hoofbeats.

A lot of hoofbeats.

She rushed to the window as a longhorn steer came into sight, from the direction of Ethan and Audra’s house.

Heath came up beside her to watch, and by the time a dozen cattle had begun to mill in the yard, Ethan rode in.

He shooed the cattle forward, through the clearing around the house and on down the trail until they were swallowed up by the woods. A grizzled cowhand with a steel-gray mustache came along from where Ethan had first emerged, then a few more men riding herd, then finally Seth.

A shocking desire to cry swelled in her throat and burned her eyes. Seth hadn’t abandoned her.

They’d brought part of the cattle here to graze on the open meadows. Seth had mentioned Ethan bringing them, but Callie hadn’t heard any plans about Seth going off to help herd them.

She hurried to the door. Swung it open, mindful of how easily cattle spooked, and caught Seth’s eye. He had a coil of rope in his hand to haze the cattle down the trail. He lifted it in a lazy salute and his wild blue eyes flashed. Too much passed between them to be possible with a single look. He hadn’t run off.

Riding drag, Seth took the time to stop. “We’ll leave half the herd to graze on a pasture near this place, and take half on to Rafe’s. We’re planning to do it in one day. Ethan wants to get there and get home so he can sleep in his own bed tonight. We’ll be a half hour or so cutting the herd. Is there anything we can have for a meal before we head on?”

For a minute she thought she might break right down and cry. It was such an embarrassing inclination that it brought her to her senses. She nodded.

“We can manage without a meal if it’s too much trouble, but something warm would sure be good. Then afterwards I want you to saddle up and come along. I’ll be all day about this and I don’t like leaving you alone here. It’s high time I started turning you both into cowhands, anyway.”

“I can outride you any day of the week, cowboy.” Callie leaned on the doorframe, so relieved her knees were a little wobbly.

“I’ll just bet that’s right, Mrs. Kincaid. I’m counting on it.” He smiled, the teasing clear in his eyes.

Heath slipped past her. “I’ll saddle up for us both.” He headed for the barn.

They were all fed and on the trail for Rafe’s within the hour.

“Look at this.” Jasper grabbed a piece of paper that scudded across his path in the sharp wind.

“What’ve you got?” Bea asked.

They were ready to saddle up and start tracking. Jasper was in the midst of thinking about his warm house back in Colorado City when he’d spotted the paper. An unusual sight, out in these remote mountains. He pressed it flat and listened to the paper crackling. It hadn’t been out here long. His eyes caught on a detail that couldn’t be mistaken for anything else.

“This is a diamond.” He jabbed his finger at a little angular shape. The whole page was covered with drawing, most of it just squiggly lines.

“Could be, Jasper.” Bea studied the picture. “And that’s the cabin.”

Nodding, Jasper looked between the paper and the little building where they’d spent the night. “There looks to be a trail up behind it. It might lead us to the diamonds.”

With an eager nod, Bea said, “Let’s go.”

They followed the map across a deep gully and found a hole in the ground right where the map said it’d be. “What do you think it means?” Jasper looked in the black pit. “Should we go down there?”

“According to the map, there’s a ladder around here somewhere.” Bea looked and Jasper threw in. Scratched-up dirt led them straight to a boulder, where they dragged out the ladder.

A few minutes of working up the nerve and Jasper climbed down into the belly of the earth. When he reached the bottom he knew immediately he was in for trouble. It was too dark. Bea almost knocked him off the ledge when she reached his side.

“Be careful, this is narrow.” Jasper produced the map, barely visible with the light from overhead. “Look at all these twists and turns. If we had a lantern, maybe we could find the diamonds hidden somewhere.”

“I don’t think so. Look at the way the diamond is drawn. It’s off to the side, almost like someone was just fiddling with the pencil. If it was a treasure map, then the diamond oughta be stuck inside the lines, marking the spot.”

Jasper scowled at the map. “Well, we know that whoever drew this most likely has the diamonds.”

Taking another look at the drawing, Bea said, “Appears this cave runs deep, with tunnels going off in different directions. But they don’t show the ends of ’em. The page is filled; I’ll bet whoever drew it made a second page.”

“It’d make pretty good sense to hide the diamonds down here. It’s about as safe a place as you can find. And drawing a map to it makes sense, too. All we need is to get our hands on one of those Kincaids and make him tell us where they hid my gems.”

“We could scare ’em good and not have to hurt anyone. We could . . . hold one of them for ransom.” Bea’s eyes gleamed in the dark cave. “If the one we grab can take us to the diamonds, then we’ll get them and scram. Leave whoever we grab behind and pull up the ladder. Then we’ll leave a note in that shack for the rest of the Kincaids. No one’ll get hurt.”

“There was a lantern in the cabin and we’ve got enough supplies that we could hide down here quite a while.”