The Colton Bride

by Carla Cassidy

  There was none.

  Chapter 18

  Cath regained consciousness slowly, her first sensation of coming out of the darkness the scent of earth filling her nose and the hardness of the ground beneath her body.

  She lay facedown, where she must have finally come to rest after hitting her head so hard she’d been rendered unconscious. Her wrists were still bound behind her back, her shoulders screaming at the strain of the unnatural position.

  The duct tape remained intact and smothered her mouth, making it impossible for her even to move her lips beneath the thick, silver tape.

  She felt the trickle of blood running down the side of her face and could only guess that the fist that had connected with her face had split the skin someplace around her eyebrow, for that area throbbed with unrelenting pain.

  She rolled over on her back and sat up, grateful for the single light bulb that dangled overhead in the small room where she was held captive. Had she awakened to the utter darkness of a tomb, she might have lost her mind completely.

  All four walls and the floor of the room were earthen, letting her know that she was someplace underground. But where? It hadn’t felt as if they’d traveled that far with her in the bottom of the wagon, but shock might have altered her ability to judge time and distance.

  The only break in the dirt was the wooden door that she’d been shoved through. She stared at the door, as if she could magically open it by the very will of her being.

  Only one way in and one way out, and that was the door. But before she could even think about somehow breaking down a door, she had to stand up, not an easy feat with her hands bound behind her back and her face and head begging her not to move.

  It took her three attempts before she finally managed to maneuver herself up to a standing position. Although her head ached and terror ruled the rhythm of her heartbeat, she advanced on the door.

  She had no illusion that it was unlocked, but she also didn’t know how thick it might be. She walked over to it, turned and knocked her knuckles against it. Solid, with a steel-like ring. Definitely far too solid for her body to attempt to break through.

  Besides, she wouldn’t do anything physical enough to harm the baby inside her. If it were possible she would have released a burst of hysterical laughter. She was the perfect victim...afraid to fight back because of her condition and now silenced from calling for help by a simple strip of strong tape.

  She walked back to the wall opposite the door and slid down to sit on her rear. There was nothing she could do but sit and wait to see what happened next.

  She kept her mind off thoughts of Gray, knowing that if she lingered there she would definitely lose her mind. She had to be strong for the bean. Her baby. She couldn’t even place a hand on her tummy to caress the life inside her, to somehow assure herself and the bean that everything would be okay.

  Instead of speculating on what happened to Gray or the baby, she thought about both the man who had taken her and the figure he’d met here in the bowels of the earth, a figure she thought might be a woman.

  Why had she seemed so familiar? Had it been Tawny hiding beneath the black clothes and ski mask? Or maybe Darla? Had they become so worried that her father would die and leave them out in the cold that they’d kidnapped Cath for the ransom she would bring?

  It would be a ransom that would give them enough money to get out of the house and live in the same kind of luxury after Jethro’s death. Had the man who had attacked her been Trip or somebody they had hired? Was it a family affair of deception?

  Or had the woman been one of the maids and the man one of the ranch workers? She couldn’t begin to guess who might be behind it, but whoever it was, was guilty of Allison’s murder.

  Were the same people also responsible for Jenny Burke’s murder? Or was there more than one strain of evil that had taken control of the Dead River Ranch?

  “Cath! Cath, are you here?”

  Gray! Her heart expanded. He was alive! He was here! Still, the voice was so faint Cath didn’t know if it was real or simply her intense desire to hear Gray’s voice one last time, the need for him to rescue her so she could tell him she loved him, that she’d always and forever love him.

  “Cath?”

  Not knowing if his cry was real or imagined, she screamed his name against the tape that kept her mute. She struggled to her feet and slammed her shoulder over and over again into the door, hoping that the sound would travel to wherever he was, hoping that he would hear the noise and come to get her out of this hellhole.

  Tears streamed down her cheeks as she held her breath and listened for his voice once again. Please, Gray. Find me. Save me.

  Nothing. She heard nothing.

  She remained by the door for what felt like an eternity, hoping, praying to hear him call to her once again. He was gone, if he’d ever been nearby in the first place.

  Maybe she’d heard him calling her from the beyond. Maybe he was telling her that soon they would all be together in death.

  On shaking legs, with her shoulder aching from the contact with the door, she stumbled back to the wall and slid down to sit, once again watching the door...waiting to find out what happened next.

  She was tired, so tired, and as she watched, as she waited, her eyes drifted closed and she fell back into the darkness.

  * * *

  Gray’s headache had abated, usurped by the panic that tightened his throat and burned in his chest. As he raced back toward the petting barn, having checked out all of the outbuilding, he was dismayed to see Dylan waiting for him there, shaking his head negatively to indicate he’d found no sign of Cath.

  “The tractor and wagon were in the shed, but there was no sign of who might have been driving it or of Cath,” he said as Gray stopped in front of him. “And I’m assuming you found nothing.”

  Gray shook his head, the panic rising up the back of his throat, nearing cutting off his ability to draw air. He looked at Dylan helplessly. “Where could he have taken her? I can’t believe I wasn’t unconscious that long...maybe ten minutes or so.”

  Together they both gazed toward the mansion. “It’s the only place we haven’t checked,” Dylan said.

  “And there are plenty of nooks and crannies, rooms and closets.” Gray took off at a run toward the house, aware of Dylan following closely behind him.

  They burst through the front door, encountering Mathilda in the hallway. “Dylan...Mr. Gray,” she exclaimed in surprise.

  “Cath is missing,” Gray said as Mathilda gasped. “We’re going to search this house from top to bottom.”

  “I’ll gather the house staff to help,” Mathilda replied.

  “No,” Gray said quickly. There was no way he would trust the word of anyone in this house where a search for Cath was concerned. He was aware that with each minute that passed he was gambling with Cath’s life.

  What he hoped was that she’d been kidnapped for ransom and whoever held her wouldn’t harm her. But he couldn’t be sure of that after the note they had received threatening her life.

  What he did know was that potentially the person holding Cath might be a member of the staff, who could lie about checking rooms and closets and keep her whereabouts in the house hidden from them.

  “Dylan and I will search, Mathilda. You keep this to yourself,” Gray said. “It’s possible the guilty party is a member of the staff.”

  Mathilda wrung her hands together, tears appearing in her eyes. “I hope that’s not true,” she said in a mere whisper. “Because if that’s the case then I hired whoever has taken her.”

  Gray put a hand on Mathilda’s shoulder. “Just go about your business as usual. We’re going to start in the basement.” He nodded for Dylan to follow him to the door that led downstairs.

  As they raced down the steps the scent of laundry soap and the heat of constantly running dryers greeted them. Bernice Black’s domain was a steamy pit of industrial-size equipment that kept the family in clean sheets, towels and clothing
.

  At this time in the afternoon the laundress was in full work mode, bent over a washing machine as Dylan and Gray appeared at the base of the stairs. She rose up with a surprised squeal, her eyes widened by the invasion into her area.

  “We need to look around down here,” Gray said, already moving to check behind machines as Dylan searched the rest of the area.

  “What are you looking for?” Bernice asked, her milky eye appearing more opaque than usual.

  “Has anyone else been down here this afternoon?” Gray asked as Dylan returned to his side with a negative shake of his head.

  “No, people don’t like to come down here unless it’s absolutely necessary,” she replied.

  “Have you been here all day?” Once again Gray felt the pound of urgency racing his heartbeat.

  “Since just after dawn,” she replied. “And nobody else has been down here today.

  “Come on, Gray, there’s nothing here.” Dylan touched Gray’s shoulder and the two men moved back upstairs where Mathilda stood looking at them anxiously.

  “I want to check out every room on the male staff floor,” he said to the housekeeper. “You have keys to everyone’s rooms. I want those rooms opened right now.” If it had been the male who’d attempted to take her twice before who had succeeded this time, it was possible that she’d been taken to one of these staff rooms and was being held behind a locked door.

  Mathilda followed Gray and Dylan up the stairs to where the male staff lived. Her fingers trembled as she began to unlock doors and Gray and Dylan checked each one of the rooms.

  It didn’t take long to clear each room. A simple check in the closets as that was the only place somebody could stash a woman. Door after door was unlocked, closet after closet was checked and still no Cath.

  Gray felt perilously close to coming undone by the time they’d checked the last room. Dylan placed his hand on Gray’s shoulder, his brown eyes sympathetic. “Okay, so we go down a level and check the great room, Jethro’s and Cath’s suites, the dining room and the kitchen.”

  They searched methodically, opening closets, checking behind furniture and pulling open cabinets that were big enough to hold a body. They worked in silence, quickly and efficiently but all the while Gray wanted to scream in agony.

  Where was she? Who had taken her? If she’d been taken off the property, then he feared they would never find her. They’d just have to wait to see if a ransom note showed up. He refused to consider that it might be her body that was found.

  After checking in Cath’s and Jethro’s suites, the great room and dining room, they finally moved to the kitchen, where Agnes eyed them with a narrowed gaze.

  “What are the two of you doing in here?” she demanded. “You know I don’t like anyone in here except my kitchen staff.”

  “Have you been in here all afternoon?” Gray asked as he opened a broom closet and then closed it.

  Agnes’s eyes narrowed further. “I stepped out for a little fresh air earlier. I’m not chained to this room. I do my job, everyone gets fed.”

  “I don’t give a damn if you take rumba lessons every afternoon,” Gray said impatiently. “I just need to know if it’s possible somebody came in here and you weren’t here to see them.”

  “I suppose it’s possible,” she said grudgingly, her back stiffened defensively.

  Gray opened up the pantry door, once again wanting to scream in frustration, in fear as he saw only shelves of canned goods and food products.

  He felt as if they were running out of time. It had been over an hour and a half since Dylan had pulled him from unconsciousness and they’d begun their search. He started to slam the pantry door when he stopped, his gaze drifting to the floor of the shelves directly in front of him.

  Something sparkled...a piece of gold chain. He leaned down to pick it up but couldn’t as it was caught on something. He tugged again, his heart stepping up a new beat, one of adrenaline, of sudden discovery.

  “Dylan, get in here,” he said urgently. “I think there’s something behind this back wall.”

  “What are you talking about?” Agnes asked as she moved closer to the pantry door.

  Both Dylan and Gray ignored her as Gray remained crouched down holding on to the length of gold and Dylan began to press and prod along the sides of wooden shelves.

  “I’ve got something,” he said, excitement lacing his voice. “It’s a lever.” He did something and the wall swung outward, displaying the sloping earth that led to what appeared to be a tunnel.

  “I’ll be damned,” Dylan said in stunned surprise.

  It was as the door swung fully open that Gray pulled the length of delicate chain from where it had been on the floor. At the end of it was the aquamarine stone Cath had worn around her neck.

  He rose to his feet, the necklace warm in his hand as he showed it to Dylan. “Agnes, we need a flashlight,” Dylan said.

  The short, plump woman reached beneath the kitchen sink and withdrew a high-power flashlight. Dylan grabbed the light and held it out to Gray, but Gray shook his head and instead pulled his gun from his holster.

  “She’s someplace down there, Dylan,” Gray said as he slipped the necklace into his pocket and turned on the flashlight.

  Now all they had to do was find her and hope that she was still alive.

  “Call Chief Peters and get him and his men here. Tell him it’s an emergency.” Dylan said to Agnes as he and Gray started down the steep sloping dirt that led down...down, the only light the beam from the flashlight in Dylan’s hand.

  “How did we not know about this?” Dylan marveled in a hushed voice. They advanced slowly, unsure what awaited them in the darkness just beyond the flashlight’s beam. “I thought we know everything there was to know about this ranch.”

  “The big question is who does know about it?” Gray replied, tightening his grip on his gun.

  The two men fell silent and they baby-stepped through the semidarkness. Gray’s heartbeat thundered erratically and Cath’s necklace burned in his pocket. He wanted to run ahead, get to the end of wherever the tunnel led, but he feared making too much noise, of making a fatal mistake. Slow and steady was better than fast and furious.

  Who had built this tunnel and why? Where did it go? Was Cath down here someplace or were they racing toward a dead end? The air was cool and smelled of the packed earth that surrounded them.

  They heard nothing as they continued forward side by side. It was like being in a grave and Gray fought the illusion that the walls were closing in on them. He battled a claustrophobia he’d never experienced before.

  He wondered if Dylan felt the same way. A glance at the man next to him showed only his friend’s features taut with tension and ghostly pale in the residual spill of the flashlight that barely pierced the darkness ahead of them.

  Seconds crept by, their footsteps faint as they inched forward. How long could this tunnel go on? Gray tried to discern the direction they traveled, the distance they had gone. They had to be in the middle of the area between the house and one of the barns Gray had checked earlier.

  Had he missed something there? A secret door? A hidden panel? Damn, had he missed something that would have led to Cath sooner?

  What worried him more than anything was the memory of the note that had been taped to her suite door. Had the person who had taken her kidnapped her for ransom or had he taken her to follow through on the promise that she would die because of the questions they’d been asking.

  He would never be able to live with himself if she’d been killed. He was supposed to be her protector. He’d wanted, no needed to be her hero, and he feared it was already too late.

  The man appeared before them in Dylan’s beam of light. In filthy clothes, he was somebody Gray had never seen before. Gray’s first instinct was to shoot, but he was afraid that if he killed the man he’d never find out where Cath had been taken.

  He expected the man to turn and run from the two figures in the tunnel, but to Gray’
s shock he barreled toward them, Dylan’s light catching the gleam of a knife in the man’s hand.

  Gray’s gun clattered to the ground. Dylan stepped backward and Gray stepped forward to meet the attacker. The man grunted and slashed the knife in the air as if wanting to use it across Gray’s throat.

  While Gray maintained a healthy respect for the weapon, there was no way this man was getting past him and no way Gray wanted him dead unless it came to a him or Gray situation.

  The filthy man and the knife upped Gray’s fear for Cath. If he found out this man had used his knife on her, Gray would see to it that the man died a slow and painful death.

  In the meantime Gray sidestepped another slash of the knife in the air, and as the man was partially turned with the motion, Gray slammed into him.

  They hit the tunnel wall with a force that whooshed the air out of the man, but he held to the knife. Gray pinned his wrist against the earth in an attempt to keep the weapon out of play.

  At the same time he raised his knee to slam the man in his groin. There was no such thing as a fair fight when it came to fighting for your life. The man anticipated Gray’s move, and Gray’s knee slammed into the dirt next to his body. “Where is she?” Gray demanded, keeping his body against the man who was fighting to get free, fighting to unpin his hand with the knife from Gray’s grip.

  He might look and smell like nothing more than a tramp, but he was strong and Gray was determined. It was a standoff with both struggling for dominance.

  Dylan trained the light on the man, as if attempting to blind him with the high-beam glare, but although he winced, it didn’t appear to weaken him in any way.

  Gray threw several punches at his face, punches that the attacker blocked with his free hand. Gray’s arm muscles began to shake as he desperately tried to keep the knife out of the picture.

  Without warning the man twisted, his hand slipped from beneath Gray’s and the knife sliced across Gray’s arm. The burning pain, coupled with the feel of blood flowing, renewed the fight in Gray.