“I understand why my brothers and father find camping to be so nice. What tree is that?” Ashleigh pointed at a stout one that blossomed with pink flowers.
“Lilac bush,” Amethyst said.
“It isn’t,” Jeremiah snapped. “That’s just a vine growing over a baby oak.”
“Let’s pick one of those flowers for Mother!” Ashleigh started down the near vertical ravine with her arms outstretched.
“You can’t; it’s too steep.” Jeremiah seized her hand and she screamed, twisting her ankle. Her body crashed forward and she tumbled sideways. Jeremiah’s footing slid and he lunged forward, the weeds slashing across both of them as they fell down the ravine.
stone slashed across Jeremiah’s face. He yelped, earning a mouthful of dirt that coated his tongue and mouth, suffocating him as it crept down his throat. A weed caught on his leg, jerking his ankle, and pain sizzled up through his back before more exploded along his arm when he hit another stone. Bloody torment. What had happened to Ashleigh? A thump sounded nearby—could it be her? She was lighter than him; she might not fall so far.
Something exploded nearby, then again, that ringing bang that caused a numbness to spread through his body. His head. He’d hit it. A roaring built up in his ears and he tried to speak, to say he felt funny, but the world faded.
“Bloody gears.” Clark braced his legs and took a step down the ravine, digging his heels into the dirt to keep his balance. Jeremiah lay still halfway down. He must’ve struck something and hit his head, since he didn’t move. Ashleigh had disappeared into the brush along the stream.
“You’ll fall too, man.” Joseph grabbed his hand. “We’ll run back and get help.”
“Yes, go.” Clark jerked free. If they were dead, he would have to save them—alone. Clark met Amethyst’s widened gaze. “Get help. I’ve scaled ravines before, I can make it down. I’ll do what I can until the others arrive.” Garth had camped before, so he should know what supplies to bring.
“Be careful.” Amethyst bolted forward to kiss his cheek before catapulting down the path. Joseph paused with a final, pale glance down the ravine before stumbling after her.
Clark worked his way down leaning backwards, dragging his fingers over the rocks and dirt to keep his balance. The pace had to stay even; if he ran, his momentum would build and he might lose his footing. The air had become dry despite the dampness in the forest. His throat tightened, but he steeled his nerves. If they were dead, he could bring them back, but he had to do it before the others returned.
Jeremiah lay with one arm flung over his chest and the other above his head. Blood soaked into the dirt, dripping across the stone he’d struck his head against.
“Don’t you know not to fall for a pretty girl? Literally.” Clark hopped beside him and knelt to keep his balance. Jeremiah’s eyes, the lids lifted, centered on the sky, his lips parted, as though he’d sought a particularly interesting shape in the clouds. He’d tried to be a gentleman, sharing his special place with Ashleigh and he’d tried to help her with dire results.
Clark rolled him onto his side to inspect the gouge. If it was too severe, it might take some work to fix, and it had to be soon, before time ran out to bring him back. Blood had soaked into the collar of his plaid shirt and the cut ran three inches across. More tears covered his clothes, trimmed in blood where his skin had ripped.
He’d seen people fall from heights, and he’d seen them die, witnessed them suffering. His stomach clenched, but he fought down that too. Jeremiah had never been nice to him, but for the Treasures’ sakes, he’d fix him up. No one deserved to die.
Except maybe the army, and Horan, and everyone else Clark had ever killed.
He untucked his blue shirt and ripped off the bottom strip. Holding his breath, Clark felt around the cut for a break in the skull—he could do nothing for him then—but the bone felt solid, other than the blood gushing from the wound. Clark tied the rag around the man’s forehead to staunch the bleeding. Jeremiah’s neck seemed awkward, bent too severely right. Clark snapped it back and closed his eyes to find the dead place.
It came to him, with the sharp colors and desert atmosphere. A shape wavered into view. Darkness enveloped the body, but it was tall, thick, a man’s spirit.
“Jeremiah, come.” Clark took the spirit’s hand and the darkness dwindled away, replaced by Jeremiah’s widened eyes.
“Where…?” Jeremiah sputtered.
“Come back to life.” Clark yanked them from the dead place. Air rushed back and he coughed, opening his eyes. Jeremiah had hesitated at the last second, but he’d gone. The body in front of Clark jerked as the spirit returned.
Jeremiah blinked his eyes and gasped, his muscles caught in a spasm. “What happened?”
“You knocked yourself out.” Clark stood and wiped his bloodied fingers on his slacks. “Stay here and don’t move. You’re bleeding. I’ll get Ashleigh, and then we’ll climb up. Amethyst and Joseph went to get help.”
“I need to find her!” Jeremiah flailed his arms as he attempted to stand, tumbling back down and wincing.
Clark scowled. The man should know when to stay down. It wouldn’t make him weak to recover. He’d kill himself again if he didn’t relax. “Stay still. You’ll open the wound. You don’t want to die.” Again.
“Ashleigh!” Jeremiah remained on his back, but he dug his fingers into the ground and panted. At least the blood loss would keep him still.
Clark maneuvered back down the ravine toward the stream. Lucky him, saving the careless few. Ashleigh should’ve known better than to try to scale an incline. Jeremiah, the gentleman rancher, couldn’t be blamed, but her—definitely.
Trees and thicker weeds grew along the stream bank, feeding off the water. Clark ducked beneath an apple tree and scanned the greenery for a glimpse of her red hair or clothes.
He saw a flash of white by a bush. She’d worn a white blouse with a denim collar. Clark fought through the weeds to reach her. She’d landed half in the stream, her head covered by water. Ginger curls floated in the current, freed from their confines, and one arm lay twisted behind her back. He would have to snap that one back, and pump the water from her lungs. He could do that after she awoke, though.
Clark lifted her by the waist to pull her from the water and laid her on a fern. Her lips parted, her skin a pallid gray, eyes open and glossy: quite dead. He gritted his teeth and snapped her shoulder back into place. It would be less painful for her if he did that before she revived. He’d learned that by helping a ranch worker once after he plummeted from a hayloft.
Her ankle had broken as well, jutting to the left instead of the right. He twisted it back. She wouldn’t be able to walk, but it would be better than getting it back into joint awake.
“What are you doing to her?” Jeremiah yelped.
Clark jerked his head up. Jeremiah staggered toward them and dropped beside Ashleigh. Curses on him, he should’ve stayed away. Clark held up his hand. “You’re not well, you shouldn’t move.”
“I need her.” Jeremiah reached for Ashleigh and pulled her against him. Her head flopped against his shoulder. Blood trickled down the back of his neck.
She needed Clark. He couldn’t save her in front of Jeremiah without exposing himself.
He couldn’t let Ashleigh die, though.
“I know what to do for her.” Clark reached for Ashleigh, but Jeremiah twisted to the side, grimacing. His head had to be dizzy from the bump and blood loss.
“You’re not a doctor,” Jeremiah rasped.
“That doesn’t matter. Doctors don’t help the poor. You learn to mend yourselves or you don’t get mended. Let me help.”
“She’ll be fine.” Jeremiah trembled. Garth and the others needed to arrive soon. Their son needed them, and Ashleigh needed Clark.
“She’s dying,” Clark hissed through clenched teeth.
“She’ll wake up. She’ll be fine.” Glossiness spread over his eyes.
“Just let me—”
> “I said no.” Jeremiah jerked the pistol free from his waist holster. His hand wavered and the barrel pointed to the sky, off to the left of Clark. Saliva dribbled down Jeremiah’s chin.
“Do you really trust me that little?” Clark stood. “You’re self-righteous and stubborn, but I can’t fault you for that. It’s your personality. Living with gangs taught me that much about people.”
“Let me…help…Ashleigh.” Jeremiah rocked with her in his lap and the gun plinked against the stones.
“Do you feel bad about me leading Amethyst’s rescue? I don’t want to be the hero.”
“Ash….” Jeremiah moaned, sagging forward.
Clark stepped toward them, and Jeremiah moaned again. He crouched to press his fingers against Ashleigh’s neck, cold and clammy from the stream. He could pull her back…
“No!” Jeremiah snarled. His lips didn’t close, more saliva dripping from his mouth.
“Hello?” Garth’s voice carried over the ravine. “We’re here. Where are you?”
Clark closed his eyes, his fingers still on Ashleigh, and leapt to the dead place. She’d gone.
Amethyst huddled beside Clark on the sofa. Zachariah had built up the fire in the hearth, wood crackling and sparks sizzling. The night closed in as if someone had sealed them in a wool blanket.
“How can Joseph sleep?” She rubbed her arms to still the goose bumps on her skin.
Zachariah stabbed at a log with the iron poker. “Some people do that to help them deal.”
“Ashleigh died.”
“Lots of people die,” Clark said.
“I can’t believe Jeremiah wouldn’t let you save her. He’s so…that’s awful of him!” Zachariah wouldn’t know what she meant by “saving” and Clark had explained to everyone how he’d attempted to help her. Because of her brother, a girl was dead, and she’d only been camping to be company for Amethyst. She pressed her wet eyes against Clark’s shoulder.
“You know Jeremiah.” Zachariah stabbed the log with more force, splitting it in half. “He’s always right.”
The others had gone to the Ottman camp, including Jeremiah with his bandaged head. He’d refused to stay in bed, insisting Ashleigh would be fine, even though her father had wrapped her in a bed sheet to take home.
“You should tell him you saved his life,” Amethyst whispered.
Clark shook his head.
“Do you suppose Mother will still have the party?” Zachariah asked.
Amethyst picked at the white polish on her fingernails. In the city, a party went on even if someone passed away. They’d actually been near when it happened, though. “Nothing stops a party.” New Addison City kept that as an infamous motto.
“Mother will probably use it as a diversion, or a way to keep us together. Remember the party she threw for me when I joined the army?”
Zachariah had joined when he turned fourteen, the legal age, and he’d been a part of it ever since. After three years of schooling, he’d been granted leave to flit back and forth between home and the barracks.
She’d faked an illness so she wouldn’t have to travel to his farewell party.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t here for that.” They might not be best friends, but Zachariah hadn’t deserved that. It wouldn’t have hurt her to visit if only for a week.
Her brother shrugged. “Most of it was Mother and her friends. You’re lucky you grew up in the city.” He set the poker in its rack beside the hearth. “I had a tutor. I never got to make friends. The only guy I had was Jeremiah. That’s what I love about the army. There are actually friends.”
Amethyst pictured the brick private school she’d attended since she was five. The other mothers had cooed over her, since she didn’t have hers available toward the end, and she’d gone to lunch at the park with her friends. She’d never had to feel lonely. How alone he must have been without companions or a club. The town certainly didn’t offer extravagance.
“I’m sorry.”
Zachariah shrugged again.
Clark turned his head as though to kiss hers, but he whispered into her hair, “Ashleigh is here.”
Amethyst stiffened. The air hadn’t shifted, keeping the same damp feel she’d sensed since fleeing from the ravine for assistance.
“She wants Jeremiah to know it’s not his fault.” Clark’s lips stirred her curls. “The doctors told her there was a lump in her skull. The headaches would worsen until the lump expanded enough to kill her. She didn’t want to survive.”
onald’s party should have prepared Clark for the excess of tonight—ribbons hanging from the ceiling and wrapped around anything available, and heaps of food that could have fed the gang for years. No one should starve when one family filled a room with tables overflowing with bowls and plates. Donald had been extravagant, but Georgette Treasure’s menu surpassed that.
Clark leaned against the railing overlooking the main hallway where a Bromi man accepted the coats and wraps of entering guests. He pictured the younger members of the gang, not yet ashamed to show weakness, crying because their stomachs were so hungry they ached. Georgette could’ve invited three-hundred people and they would still have food left over. As it happened, she’d invited one-hundred.
“That’s all?” Amethyst had asked. “In the city—”
“I’m afraid there aren’t as many people here close enough to make it,” Georgette had interrupted. Clark wondered if that had been a dig, since Amethyst had avoided family gatherings to stay in New Addison City.
Georgette hovered by the door greeting her guests by name, kissing the females on the cheek and curtsying to the men. “Mr. Roberts, hello! Mrs. Roberts, you look stunning. Might those be new diamonds?”
Clark had lined up in the hallway with the rest of the family. Georgette’s true purpose for the party shown through when she said, “I’d like to introduce you to Clark, who I wrote to you about, and Joseph, my daughter’s beau.”
Most guests stared at Clark with pressed lips and raised brows, fidgeting with whatever they held, as if unsure how to react to a bastard. He didn’t belong with the Treasures. His life involved mining and fleeing, taking whatever job he could get, shooting off pistols and riding his steamcycle until the wind numbed his neck.
“Jealous of Joseph?” Eric appeared behind him.
Clark scowled, pushing off from the railing. “They’re ignoring him. They don’t know Amethyst, so he doesn’t mean much.”
“Jeremiah’s glowering in the study.”
“Let him. He deserves his misery. I never got to mourn Mum. You don’t have time to be sad if you’re running.”
“Georgette wants you to become part of her family.”
“For your sake.” Clark lifted his gaze to the chandelier. The gaslamps along the walls reflected off the hanging crystals. “I’m thankful. I can’t tell you how much. This just doesn’t feel right. I don’t deserve any of this.”
“Clark!” Amethyst stood below, waving and rocking on her heels. Peacock feathers hung from her pinned curls and a gold chain dangled across her forehead with a sapphire in the center.
He lifted his hand in a wave. She should’ve been glorying in the attention she received for finally appearing in Hedlund, not seeking him out.
“What’s really bothering you?” his father asked.
Clark glanced over his shoulder at the ghost. “What’s my purpose in life now? Save your inventions and pretend to be a Treasure? I can never marry Amethyst. The world thinks she’s my sister.”
Her heels clicked against the stairs as she hurried up. “What are you doing up here? Who are you talking to? Oh, is Eric here? What’s he saying? I bet he wants you to stop being a hideaway.” Amethyst seized his hand, lifted it, and twirled until her back pressed against his front, his arm pinned across his chest. “I miss you. Come to the ballroom with me. Mother will have the dancing start soon. Have you eaten? The cook made these delicious apple fritters. Have you ever had apple fritters before?” She yanked him toward the staircase. �
��You won’t be a hideaway when I’m around, not when people want to know more about the Bromi.”
Jeremiah scowled into his glass of bourbon. It should burn, but even when he gulped it, that numbness lingered. Ranch hands died. A ranch could be a dangerous place. He’d seen a bull ram his horns through a man’s chest. He’d held that workers hand while the life left him, and they’d buried him in the ranch graveyard out in the back field.
Children died from illness or carelessness. Lawless men roved through town and killed a few before roving out.
Ashleigh shouldn’t have perished. He’d stood next to her. He should’ve been faster, could’ve saved her if he’d reacted better.
“Bullocks.” He scowled into his shot glass. His father expected him to move on. Double bullocks. A young woman had perished in front of him. He’d held her dead body in his arms.
Jeremiah knocked back that glass and turned in his chair to the table beside him to pour another. Laughter sounded from outside the study door. Maybe he should’ve locked it, but his father had the key in the billfold he always carried. If Jeremiah asked for it, his father would tell him to socialize.
The only light drifted in through the windows from the yard. If anyone walked by, and they probably would since his mother had transformed the gardens into a wonderland, no one would see him within the darkness.
Clark had told him not to feel bad, that Ashleigh hadn’t been healthy. You don’t suffer from physical pain in death.
Clark’s words danced through Jeremiah’s mind. People didn’t suffer from anything in death. It brought blissful peace. Not that it helped him feel better for Ashleigh, but what did Clark mean? His mother had died, but something about the way Clark spoke sent ice over Jeremiah.
He frowned into the bourbon. What else could a person suffer from in death?
Amethyst linked her fingers with Clark’s to lift their hands overhead, her hips swaying to the music. Although the band her mother had hired played what had to be a western tune—it involved banjoes and guitars—the beat did make her feet want to tap along.
Treasure, Darkly (Treasure Chronicles Book 1) Page 23
