Born of Treasure (Treasure Chronicles Book 2) Page 4

  He lifted her over a deeper puddle and directed her toward the stagecoach. The driver huddled on the porch of the saloon. He tipped his mug at them as Clark waved.

  Clark opened the stagecoach door and helped Amethyst inside. Larger than a steamoach, it would hold up to twenty-people, and take them back to Snow Ridge where they’d left their luggage at the inn. He took off his hat and shook it at the floor. Droplets sprayed in the light of the gas lamp above.

  Amethyst spread out on the seat. “You think we’ll have the ride to ourselves?”

  “Would be nice.” Clark parted the curtain to peer through the window of the door, but the gas lamp inside caused his own reflection to answer his gaze.

  “That man on the way here—ugh!—I swear he hasn’t bathed a day. Ever. I’ve never smelt anything so bad.”

  Clark chuckled. “Stay out of fields, then.” He removed the journal and ran his finger over the worn cover. His father had kept this with him. He’d read from it, recorded his dreams and his days. The book had seen more of the man than Clark ever would.

  “I can see why people resort at Snow Ridge.” Amethyst shook water off her skirt. “The skiing must be nice in the winter. I went skiing once with Mary, a friend of mine back in the city. It wasn’t very fun. Quite tedious to stay upright. I ended up staying in the lodge. I found the most delightful people in there.”

  Clark opened to the first page, where his father had written his name and the date. He turned to the next, where his father had made an inventory of the contents of his desk.

  “Have you ever been skiing? We’ll go sometime. You might enjoy it. You’re more… athletic.” She leaned forward and lowered her voice. “Especially in the bedroom.”

  He winked at her, but his hands trembled around the journal. It shouldn’t mean that much, but his father had written those words. He’d mulled over what to say and then chose.

  “They made us keep a diary when we were in school.” She bounced across the compartment to sit beside him, leaning against his shoulder. His coat had to be damp, but she smiled as if it didn’t matter. Rain had smudged the kohl and blue paint around her eyes giving her a ghostly look—spirits had those dark-rimmed eyes.

  “I never had enough paper to do something like this.” How would he know what to say? Who would care about the ramblings of a fugitive? “I could mention where I stayed the night. People would love to hear about how I slept under a fir tree because the lowest branches can add the most coverage.”

  Amethyst licked a raindrop off his neck. “Some people might like to hear about what you went through. I could help you write it down.”

  “Whatever you want.” He flipped through the pages in his father’s diary. Some were written in pencil, others in ink. Sometimes, he used careful printing, and other times his handwriting became cramped cursive. Clark scowled. “I can’t read this.”

  “It’s not too messy.”

  His fingers curled around the covers. He could read the printing in newspapers and books, even if some of the words confused him, but no one had ever showed him cursive. His mother taught him to write using block letters and the seamstress in Tangled Wire, his beloved mentor, hadn’t bothered with fancy styles.

  “You’ll never use much book learning,” she’d said. “Breed young, lad. Men folk don’t last too long in the mines. You’ll be lucky to reach forty.” Despite advances in technology, accidents happened. A few too many breaths of poisonous gases and a fellow dropped over dead.

  Amethyst pointed at the middle of the page. “This mentions a Judith. That was your mother’s name, right?”

  Clark froze. “Yeah.” His father had met his mother then?

  Eric appeared on the seat across from them with a smile on his blackened mouth. “That’s another reason I wanted you to fetch that one. I can tell you how much I loved her, but it’s after the fact. I wanted to show you.”

  A tear stabbed Clark’s eye. “Brass glass.” He drew a deep breath that shook in his lungs. If he were with anyone else, he’d be ashamed, or think about the army to anger himself. The diary should be read in private, yet he couldn’t.

  “Am, will you… read it to me?” Did that hoarse voice belong to him? He hadn’t sounded so meek since he was a child and the saloon owner whipped him with a belt for knocking over a tray of biscuits.

  His mother had suffered abuse for giving up a night to lay him on her bed and wash his back with cold rags.

  Amethyst linked her arm through his and rested her cheek against his shoulder. “Tell me if you want me to stop.” She tapped the page with her fingernail to follow the words she read. “I rescind my earlier comments about Tangled Wire being a haven for incest and crime. Most of these Western mining towns fare the same. I can easily brand this as the king’s heel, for this president doesn’t care either, and this seems to be the human filth the east has ridiculed. Tangled Wire, however, has a gem. Her name is Judith…Kurjaninow?” Amethyst paused on the name until he nodded. “I can call her pretty, for she is. The Eastern beauties would think her plain despite the make-up she’s forced to wear, but her smile captured the room.”

  “I hated those cosmetics,” Eric said. “I would have preferred her without anything.”

  Clark closed his eyes as more tears threatened. His mother had deserved a quiet home where she could be appreciated for more than how much money she could wrangle.

  “She served Garth and I our supper in the saloon,” Amethyst read. “She seemed nervous, unlike the other Tarnished Silvers. I asked her how long she’d been employed and she claimed for only a few months. I saw miners leering at her and to keep her from them, I bought her for the night. We spoke. It would take a journal unto itself to describe the histories we shared, but I will mention that she is an orphan at sixteen. We are alike in that parentage. She sleeps now and I write. I know Garth will be laughing at me, for we both swore not to ever pay for love. He has a wife to consider, and his sons. I have myself, and now I feel as though I have this Judith.”

  The stagecoach door slapped open and a thick man lumbered inside, rain splashing off his oiled coat across the floor. Clark snapped the journal shut so fast he caught Amethyst’s finger. She yelped, jerking it away. Clark hid the journal in his jacket as the newcomer splayed across the opposite seat.

  “Nasty weather,” he snarled. A thick brown beard streaked with gray protruded from his face, the moustache hiding his lips. Buckles and chains adorned the front and sleeves of his coat.

  “Are you taking the stagecoach?” Amethyst asked.

  “Course I am. Why else I be in here?” he bellowed. His voice seemed to shake the windows.

  Clark imagined the army, hearing the stomp of their horses in the forest as he fled, seeking cover. The closest he ever came to them happened there, where they came upon him almost at night, tracking him or hearing from trappers that they’d spotted a fellow hiking. He could escape better from ranches, when he could blend in with other ranch hands. The army moved as a group. A huge sight of blue-garbed men on horseback raised alarms.

  The tears dried in his eyes.

  “Your luggage up top?” he asked as something to say.

  “Don’t need no luggage,” the bearded man roared. “I’m a mountain hider. Got all I need right in here.” He patted the front of his coat; things jingled underneath.

  “You hide in the mountains?” Amethyst frowned.

  He hooted and slapped his leg. “That’s a funny one, chit.”

  “He hunts mountain lions,” Clark explained. “Easterners pay good money for a mountain lion hide to make into a coat. Maybe you have one.”

  “I don’t believe in furs.” She sniffed. “They appear crass. I’m part of the new belief that animals shouldn’t be slayed for the betterment of man.”

  “Funny, funny chit.” The mountain hider stuck out his thick paw. Tears decorated his leather gloves. “Name’s Ryann.”

  “Clark Grisham, and my wife.” He kept his face neutral as he shook. They needed to be forgetta
ble. The army often questioned mountain hiders, since they trekked the forests and plains. They saw when new people appeared and when the land was disturbed.

  The door opened again, this time allowing in a young woman wearing a green dress. The driver poked his head inside the stagecoach, water pouring off his cap. “We’ll be heading out now, folks. I want to get there before the roads close.” He slammed the door. Rain pelted the roof and the gas lamp flickered.

  The girl sat beside Amethyst and tugged up the front of her sleeveless dress. Layers of frills, lace, and petticoats puffed around her legs. “Howdy, folks. Mighty bite out there in this weather, eh?”

  Clark had been in her state before, running from something in his only clothes and no covering against the elements, putting up a friendly front to hide the pain within. He peeled off his coat, leaving his jacket on, and handed it to her. “Keep it.”

  Rain glistened on her skin. Cosmetics trickled down her cheeks in black streaks and her crimson curls clung to her head, darkened almost to brown. She clutched the coat to her chest and blinked. “You… you mean it?” Those in real need didn’t use modesty to refuse a gift.

  He didn’t have anything in the pockets, and the wonder of his father’s wealth meant he could help those who’d once been like him. “I’m sure.”

  Amethyst shied against him to get away from the girl, and he stiffened. She couldn’t help what life had given her.

  “What’s your name?” he asked. It made a fellow feel better to give everyone his fake name and further the disguise.

  She burrowed into the coat and lifted the collar, sighing. “Um, Karlie.”

  “Excuse me.” Clark kissed Amethyst’s lips before stepping around her to squeeze into the seat between her and Karlie. Amethyst narrowed her eyes at him, but he could explain once they were alone, without Ryann to overhear.

  The steam engine rumbled to life and the stagecoach jerked forward. The gas lamp flickered again. Rain slapped the ceiling and roof; water had to leak in somewhere to fiddle with the lamp flame.

  “My mother was a Tarnished Silver,” Clark whispered to Karlie. Her eyes widened. He’d been right about her profession, then, judging by the low-cut bodice and the scars around her extended bosom where someone had operated on her to make them larger. “Did you get sent off or you running away?”

  Amethyst squeezed his arm to get his attention back to her, but he stared at Karlie.

  She gulped. “I ain’t done nothing wrong. I…” Another gulp. “I can’t stay here no more.”

  That could’ve meant anything: a customer stalking her, the brothel owner forcing her to do things she didn’t want, an angry coworker torturing her.

  Clark turned to kiss Amethyst’s cheek. “I’ll explain later.” He nodded to Karlie. “You’ll be safe in here.”

  “Can I pay ya for some along the way?” Ryann asked in his huge voice.

  Karlie stared at him through lowered lids. “If ya want. I charge a brass every hour.”

  Ryann felt in his coat pocket. Amethyst sucked breath between her teeth.

  “That shouldn’t go on with my lady present,” Clark interrupted. A Tarnished Silver worked where she could, be it in private or public, but Amethyst deserved to think of intercourse as sweet love making. She didn’t need to see how crass it could become.

  The stagecoach creaked and jerked as if a demon had possessed it, and that demon wanted the coach to contort into a devilish being of horns and fangs. It tilted to the left so suddenly that the occupants slammed into the side with thuds and screams. The driver shouted something, muffled through the stagecoach walls, and the rain seemed to come down fiercer, as if nature wanted to hide the panic within. Thunder rumbled as the coach titled further, spinning in a circle; the occupants tossed again, and water exploded through the windows. Shattered glass mixed with the frigid wave.

  lass cut into Amethyst’s hand, the sharp pain coming a second after she felt her skin part. Water soaked through her clothes and filled her mouth like a tongue seeking hers in a twisted kiss. She coughed, turning her head away as the muck splashed over the slut who lay against her. Clark pushed himself off from both of them, his eyes wide. Water stained his hair and front until he became a dark, bloody being, rising from an unearthed grave. Amethyst reached for him, but she had become a creature of wickedness as much as he was; blood dripped down her hand to form a lacelike pattern.

  “What’s goin’ on?” Ryann bellowed. He lay against the coach on the other side of the broken door. The gas lamp illuminated the water gushing through the broken window.

  “What a stupid stagecoach!” Amethyst shoved the slut away from her. “Can you believe this? I’ll have the company know how reckless the driver is. Now we’re even more soaked and filthy. I can’t imagine the state of your luggage up top. I’m just glad ours is at the inn.”

  Clark stood, bracing himself against the wall near Amethyst’s head. He pounded his fist against the door until it snapped open, the curtain fluttering. Rain stampeded over them and a wave gushed inside.

  “Brass glass.” Clark crouched to grab Amethyst’s hand. “The road must’ve flooded. We’re stuck in the river.”

  “Someone will have to fish us out.” It would take even longer now to get back to the inn. She’d been looking forward to a warm meal and a cozy night of cuddling with Clark near the hearth in the downstairs. The night before, a fiddler had entertained the guests, and Clark had gotten to teach her a new dance.

  Why did he gape at her like that?

  “If they can get to us,” he growled. “People drown. Can you swim?”

  He had to be joshing. “Of course I can’t swim.” Her heart started to pound. “You can, right? We must be safe in this stagecoach.”

  “The river must’ve swelled,” Karlie gasped.

  The gas lamp flickered. A wire snapped and sizzled; the light blinked out.

  Amethyst dug her fingernails into Clark’s arm. “You can save us.”

  The water had filled the stagecoach up to her waist as she sat up. As a child, she’d worried about drowning in the rooftop pools; she’d never imagined it could occur in a coach. She laughed, even though it sounded sadistic amongst the waves. Clark pulled her up and she wobbled against him. He wouldn’t let her drown. Vulgar water wouldn’t be the end of Amethyst Treasure-Grisham. The structure bobbed in the river; it was a boat, just a boat, she didn’t need to panic. Clark tightened his arms around her waist. As long as she had him, she would be all right. Even if she did drown, he could bring her back to life.

  He didn’t care about Karlie. He didn’t try to comfort her. Amethyst was the special one.

  A crack exploded in her ears and the stagecoach tore apart. That couldn’t be a sign of salvation. Hunks of wood and metal rained over them. Had they sliced through them? Would she feel the pain later, like what had happened with the glass? Water drenched her as though she would never be free of it. Clark slipped from her arms as the river covered her head. The current beat against her as if to whisper, “Let me kill you, little girl. Let me steal your life into my depths.”

  Her heart pounding, she clawed and kicked for purchase. The ground slipped by, and the current kept shrieking in her mind: “You’re mine!” Her hand brushed something; something else snared the back of her jacket and jerked her head from the water. She gasped, her lungs burning.

  “Don’t struggle,” Clark shouted.

  Rain pelted her face and the frigid water bit through her skin. He looped his arm across her chest and tugged her through the waves. She squeezed her eyes shut. Clark knew what he was doing; he wouldn’t let anything hurt her.

  The ground hit her backside and he pulled her to her feet. She stumbled as he turned her to face him and his mouth crushed hers. His tongue darted past her teeth and lips. She grabbed his shoulders, pressing her front against him and moaning, tasting dirt and rain and his breath.

  “What happened?” she gasped when he swayed back.

  “We hit a tree. It tore through it.�
�

  Rain washed the filth off her face. “I’ve never been in a flood before. Are they always this bad?”

  Clark nodded. “I’m going to see if I can find Karlie and Ryann. Stay here and if the water rises, keep backing up. Don’t move from this area. Promise me.”

  “Don’t find me,” Karlie said. “I’m happy now.”

  Clark jerked around, gaping at the spirit floating over the rushing creek. Lighting flashed in the sky, but Karlie shown brighter. His coat hung off her, huge and manly, but protective, as if someone had finally cared about her.

  “Karlie, where’s your body?” He stepped toward her, still clutching Amethyst’s hand. “I can bring you back.”

  “I’m safe now. No one can hurt me.”

  Words from his mother exploded around his head. I just want us to be safe, where no one can hurt us. “I can take you somewhere safe. I have a house in Hedlund City. I can set you up.” He could do for Karlie what he couldn’t do for his mother. “I can put you in a school, or a profession.” He had no idea how to do that, but he could figure it out. His mother once told him how she would’ve loved to attend a school and become a piano teacher.

  Karlie wasn’t his mother, could never be his mother.

  “Let me go.” Karlie smiled. How could a Tarnished Silver, younger than him, see a part of him he liked to hide? “It’s better.” Her spirit shimmered in the rain that wouldn’t touch it, and vanished.

  “Clark?” Amethyst whispered.

  He pulled the journal from his jacket. Water dripped off the leather cover, the pages stuck together. Numbness crept over his mind. He peeled at the pages, but they stuck, a corner tearing. The pencil had faded in the muck and the ink ran along the fibers.

  Eric had tried to help a Tarnished Silver, Clark’s mother, by wanting to take her away. Most men only used a Tarnished Silver and moved on to the next. Women snubbed them. Children were told horror stories to keep them away.