“I’m trying to believe you,” Patience said, making an effort to curb her temper. “But be fair. No one but you has seen that man.”
He threw his hands up. “Have it your way. There is no Frank Innis or Silas Tucker. I’m a raving lunatic, and you can run the mine by yourself. Well, be my guest, honey. I’ve had enough.”
He stalked off, leaving her to stare after him. She should have hung on to her temper. Should never have crossed him. What if he had been telling the truth, and she had refused to believe him? What would she do if he didn’t come back?
Patience opened the dugout door and looked out. Jay hadn’t come to supper tonight, although she had cooked his favorite: panfried catfish that Wilson had caught in the cool sparkling waters of the little creek.
Closing the door, she cleared away the remains of the meal and washed the dishes. After Wilson lay sleeping in front of the fire, she sat in the old rocking chair, staring into the flames, reliving their argument. What would she do for a crew? If Jay wasn’t here to guard the women, they wouldn’t be allowed to work.
Why had she let him walk away? It felt like he had ripped her heart out and taken it with him. What would she do if he never came back? She had grown so used to having him around, had looked forward to seeing him every day.
She sat before the fire until the flames burned low and the creeping cold drove her to her bed. Wrapped in a blanket, she lay staring into the smoldering coals, seeing Jay Longer in the flickering shadows, until she cried herself to sleep.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Patience waited at the mine entrance before sunup with a lump of lead for a heart. Would he come? Wilson was outside, feeding his animals, completely oblivious to the storm raging inside her.
She watched the trail, ears straining to hear the approach of the shady ladies. When she first heard them coming, she couldn’t believe her ears. They plodded up the trail, Moses in the lead, Jay trailing along behind. Patience sank down on a nearby boulder, her knees too weak to support her.
He glanced at her and then looked away. Moses and the other women walked past her into the mine.
Patience waited until Jay stopped in front of her, not smiling. She wet her lips. “You came back.”
“Yeah.”
“I was afraid you wouldn’t.”
“If I had any sense, I’d be halfway to Denver City by now.”
“I’m glad you stayed. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have doubted you.”
He looked away. “I have to get to work.”
She watched him walk away, but the sun shone in her world again. She’d fix him a good dinner. If the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach, Jay Longer wouldn’t know what hit him.
“Please, God,” she breathed, “don’t let anything else go wrong.”
Later that morning, a fracas broke out in front of the mine, bringing Patience running. Wilson left his beloved animals to join the uproar. The shady ladies milled around, making more noise than a flock of hens. One convict, looking more groggy than usual, staggered around in circles, muttering something about wanting to take a pickax handle to that ghost.
Moses stood, arms akimbo, dark brows drawn together, lips set in a bitter line. As Patience joined them, she glared in her direction. “We quit!”
“Quit? You can’t quit, Moses!”
“Quit.” Moses sported an angry bruise between her eyes.
This morning’s incident was the last straw. Someone had rigged the women’s picks so that when they swung them, the heads flew off and hit them squarely between the eyes. One of the ladies had been knocked cold and hadn’t come around for a full ten minutes.
“I know it’s hard to work with all these accidents, but if you’ll be patient just a little longer—” Patience looked to Jay for support.
He looked the other way, stubbornness etched on his stoic features.
The shady ladies picked up their shovels and walked off with Moses, mumbling something about there not being enough gold in Colorado to put up with this.
Patience watched them leave, realizing what it meant. There wasn’t a man, woman, or child left willing to work the Mule Head.
Trying not to cry, she turned to Jay. “Shouldn’t you walk them to the prison camp?”
“I’ll follow them back. Are you all right?”
Dropping her face to her hands, Patience whirled and ran to the dugout. She sank down at the kitchen table, letting the tears flow. How could he ask her if she was all right? He had stood there and said nothing as the women walked away. Didn’t he care they had no other help to work the mine?
Where are you, God? He’d promised to be there in time of need. Why didn’t he do something about all of these accidents? She raised her head, wiping away tears. They couldn’t all be accidents. Not all of the pick heads coming loose at once. One, maybe, but not all of them at the same time. Jay was so sure someone was trying to drive them away. Had he been right all along?
Her heart hardened with resolve. No one was going to drive her away from what was rightfully hers. She would fight as long as she had breath.
Forgetting the convicts, Jay pitched the shovel aside and angrily strode toward the mine, with no thought of his phobia. For the first time in a long time, rage blinded him. He didn’t care about the gold. Mooney Backus could do whatever he wanted to him, but without the gold Patience was sunk. She wasn’t chasing luxury; she was fighting for survival. And he was going to fight Frank Innis to the death, if that’s what it took.
Snatching up the lantern, he entered the mine, shouting, “Frank! Show yourself!”
A bat darted up and away, vanishing into the darkness.
“Frank!”
Frank … Frank … Frank echoed back.
Jay moved deeper into the shaft, his eyes searching the darkness. “Enough’s enough!”
Overhead, timbers snapped and splintered down. Jumping aside, Jay avoided the flying debris.
“Cut it out, Frank! For once in your life fight like a man!”
Water rushed through the mine. Grasping the wall, Jay struggled to keep his balance. A whirlpool swirled around his thighs. The shaft plunged into darkness as the lantern fell from his hand and the current swiftly carried it away.
He could feel his lungs closing. Struggling for breath, he held tight to the sides of the ledge. “If you want to fight someone, fight me. Let Patience have the gold. You’ve lived your life—she’s young, got most of her life ahead of her. She needs the means to take care of the boy and three other women who don’t have a chance in this world without that gold. This plan of yours and Tucker’s won’t work. I’ll personally dog you for the rest of my life, Frank. That’s a promise!”
An explosion rocked the mine, splintering rock and pitching timbers through the air.
The thought hit him: he was going to die. This was how his life would end, alone in a black hole. He should have enough sense to be afraid, but he wasn’t. Blackness closed around him, filling his senses, squeezing the life from his lungs.
Walls collapsed and buckled.
Racked by coughing spasms, Jay clung to the wall. Dust fouled the air, and a thick grit filled his mouth and stung his eyes. The air supply in the narrow chamber dwindled. “You’re evil, Frank,” he choked out. “You can kill me, but you won’t kill her spirit. She’ll stay and fight… .”
A sheet of fire burst overhead. Angry flames licked across the ceiling, searing the timbers.
Strangling, Jay struggled for breath. And for life. Plowing through the rising water, he blindly felt his way back through the shaft. He didn’t want to die. The realization hit him hard. If he died, Patience would have no one.
She needed him.
And he needed her.
He didn’t want to die. The revelation was exhilarating and sobering. The meaning of life, which he had forgotten, suddenly came back. Wallowing in self-pity was for cowards. It took guts to stand up and fight back.
The ground vibrated beneath his feet. He inched along the sha
ft wall and edged toward the entrance.
Timbers shattered; dirt and shale hurled through the air. The tunnel became a living, roaring nightmare.
Stumbling out of the shaft, he fell to the ground, gasping for breath, only seconds before the mine entrance violently collapsed shut.
Patience raced for the mine, heart in her throat, when she heard the roar of an explosion. A big explosion. Much bigger than Jay or the shady ladies ever set off. Dust and rocks blasted through the mouth of the mine. The crash of falling debris boomed like cannon fire.
Wilson, white-faced, came running. “Jay! Where’s Jay?”
Patience saw him lying facedown a few feet from the shaft. She and Wilson caught him by the arms, pulling him away from the mine as another explosion rocked the earth.
“Wilson, bring water. Hurry.”
She knelt beside Jay, her fingers groping for a pulse. Dear God, let him be all right.
Jay felt a cool cloth on his face. P was softly calling his name. She tenderly dabbed the wet cloth back and forth over his battered face.
“Jay … please … wake up. Please … Jay.”
Cracking one eye open, he scowled. “What for?”
With a sob of relief, Patience dropped her head to his chest, hugging him tightly around the waist. “I thought you were dead.”
He struggled to sit up, massaging the knot on the back of his head. “I thought I was too.”
She lifted the hem of her apron and wiped fresh tears, then glared at him. “You scared the life out of me!”
Getting to his feet slowly, he knocked the dust off his denims, grimly surveying the blocked entrance to the mine. “I can assure you, this wasn’t my idea.”
“Oh, Jay!” She turned to survey the damage. “Not again!”
Reaching for his hat, he dusted it off before settling it back on his head. “Are you convinced now that we’re fighting a losing battle?”
Whirling, she grasped the front of his shirt, catching him off-balance. “We can’t let those evil, claim-jumping thugs beat us!”
Gently loosening her hands, he said quietly, “They already have, Patience. Face it.”
Her face crumbled. “But what will I do? I have no money—nothing for Wilson … ”
His eyes softened. “Patience, it’s over. Moses just quit and took her crew with her. We’ve dug that shaft out too many times to do it again. We don’t have enough funds to buy fuses and dynamite, and we couldn’t hire another crew if our lives depended on it.”
She gazed back at him, defeat shadowing her eyes. “Wilson’s and my life do depend on it.”
“No, they don’t.” Taking her by the shoulders, he made her look at him. “I’m not a quitter, but I know when I’m beat. You and I sure can’t dig that shaft out again. We’re beat. Men like Frank Innis and Silas Tucker are never going to let anyone get that gold.”
“But—”
“No buts. You’re not going to talk me out of this. I’m taking you back to Denver City. You don’t belong here. You deserve to sleep in a warm bed, take decent baths, and go to sleep with a full belly every night. You need pretty clothes and proper suitors.” His eyes gentled. “You need a husband, Patience—one who can give you all you deserve.”
“But the gold would pay off your gambling debts.”
A muscle flexed in his shadowed jaw. “We don’t have the gold; we never will.”
Meeting his eyes, she bit back tears. “What about us?” He tried to look away but she wouldn’t let him. “What about us? You can’t deny there’s something between us—something incredibly special, Jay. You can’t just walk away from me and Wilson—”
Pain shot through him. Five years dropped away, and he was losing the one he loved again. “There is no us, Patience. I thought you understood that.”
“No,” she whispered. “I didn’t understand that.”
He gently broke the embrace. “I worked your mine. That’s all I promised.”
“Yes,” she said brokenly, “that is all you promised.”
The hurt he saw in her eyes cut him deeper than any knife could, but he wasn’t the man for her. She deserved more than a loser unable to pay his gambling debts, a man who would be hounded or shot, depending on how much he could come up with.
Tears rolled down her cheeks.
“Don’t start that,” he warned. “We gave it our best shot, and we lost. I have to see if Moses and the other women made it back to the prison. It’s my obligation. If they decided to run, that’s also my obligation.”
“And I’m not your obligation.” Before he could answer, she whirled and walked off.
He watched her climb the hill to the dugout, her small frame buffeted by the cold wind, and he wanted to stop her, hold her, kiss her until the hurt left her. But he knew he couldn’t. Right now she felt wounded and betrayed, but someday she would understand what he’d just done. She would realize that he loved her enough to set her free.
Hot tears formed in his eyes, and he self-consciously wiped at the moisture, mentally castigating his weakness.
Someday, she’d thank him.
The thought didn’t cheer him the way it should. He didn’t want her thanks. He wanted her beside him, in his arms. He could close his eyes and smell the sweet wildflower fragrance of her hair, see the way her eyes sparked with laughter.
He stumbled over a loose rock, almost falling. She only thought she loved him. Sheltered by life in the orphanage, she had no experience with the relationship between a man and a woman. She’d find someone her own age. Someone who could give her the kind of life she deserved.
The thought almost choked him. He couldn’t bear thinking about Patience in another man’s arms. How could he walk away? But for her sake, he had no choice.
She would go back to Denver City and make a life. He’d see her from a distance—but he’d keep that distance. That was the problem now; he’d let down his guard.
But never again. Never again.
Chapter Twenty-Three
What time is it?”
“Ten minutes later than the last time you asked.” Chappy held the miniature hummingbird he was carving up to the light. Thick clouds formed a low-hanging, pewter-colored ridge in the west. “You got it bad, haven’t you, son?”
Perched on the hitching rail, Jay watched loaded wagons moving up and down the street. Oh, he had it bad, all right. Once his anger cooled, he realized that he couldn’t walk away; Patience and Wilson were his life now. He’d given himself quite a talking-to back at the mine, but the walk down the mountain had done a lot to clear his thinking.
Yes, he was too old for her, and no, he wasn’t good enough—probably never would be—but he loved her, and he wasn’t going to let any other man have her. He’d let down his guard, but God had turned that into a blessing. All his doubts and insecurities had hardened into resolve. Patience belonged to him, and he wasn’t planning to give her up.
Trouble was, he didn’t know how to tell her. How do you tell a woman that you’ve fallen in love with her against every determination not to, and that you’re not a prize catch for any woman, but that you’ll gladly spend the rest of your life taking care of her and the boy—if she’ll have you?
He’d work night and day to pay off his gambling debt and get his life back in order—if she would forgive him for the way he had acted. And if God would forgive him for the last five years of bitterness and blaming his ills on everybody but the man responsible for his misery: Jay Longer. All he had to do was ask.
His blood raced with expectancy when he thought of Patience. He missed her: the touch of her hand, her smile, the sound of her voice. A foreign feeling, to be sure, but one he couldn’t deny.
“Gonna marry her?”
“If she’ll have me.”
“Unless I miss my bet, she will.” Wood chips from Chappy’s knife flew to a scattered pile at his feet. “You never talked much about yourself. Where’d you say you come from?”
“Phoenix.”
“Phoenix,
huh?” Chappy paused, brushing the shavings off his lap. “Suppose you got family there?”
“Some. Sister, father.”
“Mother?”
“She died in ’59.”
“Sorry to hear it. Your pa in good health?”
“I haven’t seen my father in a while, but I suspect that he’s in good health for a man his age.”
Jay thought about the long hours Gordon Longer worked, delivering babies, treating dyspepsia with doses of bismuth, rheumatism with bicarbonate of soda laced with lemon juice. He had apprenticed four years by his father’s side before marrying Nelly. His life had turned out different from what anyone expected.
“Suppose you’ll be going back someday?”
“No—don’t ever plan to.” Jay’s eyes skimmed the ragged, snow-covered Rockies, and he knew he would never go back. He loved this land; loved the way the sun kissed the mountain slopes, the wildflowers that bloomed in the high meadows, the clear streams, and the abundant wildlife. The rugged pioneers who had settled here were good people for the most part. He was proud to be one of them. Together, he and P could make a good life for Wilson. He wasn’t sure about kids of his own—the thought of Brice still hurt—but Wilson needed a father. “Colorado is home now.”
Smiling, Chappy turned the carving over in his hands, critically examining his work. “What d’you think the woman will do now? Heard the Mule Head sealed tighter than a tick this morning. Crew walked off—left the woman empty-handed.”
“I’ll open it again.” Jay had been doing a lot of thinking the past few hours. Odds were against them, but if Patience wanted to reopen the mine, he was going to hire another crew, even if he had to go to Denver City to do it. Right now, he had to work up the nerve to face her. She couldn’t be too happy with him at the moment.
Chappy’s voice broke into his thoughts. “You talked to Frank yet?”
“Yeah. I’ve talked to Frank, but I’ve got a few more things to say to him. He almost killed me.”
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