Trouble At Lone Spur (24 page)

Night was gradually replaced by the purple streaks of dawn. With the rising sun and the long-awaited delivery of the multihead bore came renewed hope.

Sunlight also brought a new complication in the form of Gil Spencer’s ex-wife. She descended from a beautifully restored 1960 white Cadillac, her flame red hair brighter than the struggling sun. The fringe on her white boots kicked up puffs of dust. White twill pants caressing every curve were cinched at the waist by a goldsmith’s trophy—a buckle declaring her three-time world-champion barrel racer. Her hat—a Charlie One Horse—flashed when she walked, or rather the hat band of gold-tone conchos did. Her caped Western blouse bore
the trademark lightning strikes of Brooks and Dunn. A hush fell over the mass of workers as they parted to let her pass.

Liz closed her mouth with a snap and brushed at her dirt-encrusted jeans. Lord, the woman sashayed through the tents like a queen. A
rodeo
queen, Liz reminded herself. What, she wondered, was Ginger Lawrence doing here with the rodeo due to play its biggest money-stake on the circuit next weekend? Liz learned soon enough.

Ginger spotted Gil climbing out of the pit. She ran to him and began pounding on his chest. “It’s your fault! Your fault!” she screeched. “You’ve neglected my babies again. I knew this would happen when that lousy judge gave them to you. All you ever really cared about was this damned land.”

Surprised by the unprovoked attack, Gil grabbed Ginger’s upper arms and thrust her away just as Liz raced to his side. Flashbulbs winked and video cameras whirred. A case of hysterics like this was always news.

Gil released her the minute he realized they were becoming public spectacles. He was dog-tired from his stint in the pit and more than forty-eight hours without sleep. He didn’t know who the hell had summoned Ginger, but he’d learned long ago that arguing only spurred her on. About then, he spotted Liz, her eyes wide, a hand flung over her mouth. Smothering a curse, he went to blow off steam.

One glance was enough for Liz to recognize the tired slump of Gil’s shoulders and the despair in his eyes. Blotting out the crush of bystanders, she marched up to the sweetheart of the rodeo and spun her around. “You have some nerve yelling at Gil. You can’t even remember the twins’ birthdays. And they’re not babies. They’re growing boys. Did you know or care that Dustin grew
two inches and needed new clothes twice since school started? It was Gil, not you, who sat through teacher conferences and cheered at their Halloween play. Gil who tramped through twenty toy stores buying their Christmas gifts. I’d watch who I was calling neglectful, if I were you.”

The redhead’s green cat-eyes narrowed. “Well, well. I thought there was something familiar about the female creature clinging to my husband’s arm in that television blip.”

“Your ex-husband,” Liz said. “I can’t say I’ve missed shoeing your spoiled buckskin, Ginger. The horses
and
the horse owners on the Lone Spur have much better manners.”

Ginger’s eyes frosted. Leaning toward a skinny man busily writing in a notebook, she said in a low voice, “If you’re looking for a real story, gentlemen, check with the rodeo commission. I lodged complaints against Lizbeth Robbins on two occasions for cruelty to my horses. This is the type of person Gilman chose to care for our twins. Is it any wonder my precious baby had an accident? He was probably trying to escape this…this meanie.”

The last part of Ginger’s barb struck too close to home. Liz felt her skin go pasty, and she knew the moment heat stung her cheeks that Ginger had scored ten points to her two. The man with the notebook backed her into a corner. Liz shoved him aside. “Oh, for pity’s sake,” she snarled. “Our main concern here should be to pray for Dustin Spencer’s safe recovery. Excuse me please, there are hardworking men out there who need food and fresh coffee.”

When Lizbeth didn’t join him at the tent, Gil worked his way back through the onlookers to see why not. He had a ringside view of Lizbeth’s passionate performance
on his behalf. Her loyalty was beautiful to see.
She
was beautiful. And the way she’d flown to his defense…Admiration for her still shone in his eyes as the man in front of him left and Gil glanced up to encounter Ginger’s cold stare. He felt its chill even more when she bounced a venomous glare off Lizbeth’s retreating back. Gil might have warned her away had Jarvis not sent someone to get him just then. Ginger was capable of shedding realistic tears at the drop of a hat, and she was a darned convincing liar. However, Gil didn’t think her malice extended beyond him. There’d be time to deal with her later, to find out what she really wanted.

Gil went to join Jarvis in the shaft they were slowly sinking next to the one that trapped Dustin. Meanwhile, Ginger wound through the crowd, planting seeds of doubt about Lizbeth’s competence. Of course, people didn’t really know Gil’s farrier well. Catching comments here and there, Liz ignored Ginger’s remarks—until she began to experience the fallout. The volunteers, with the exception of Nan Littlefield and Kyle Mason’s wife, weren’t quite as friendly to her as they’d been before.

“Where’s your fancy-dancy cowboy flash-rider?” Nan sniped at Ginger.

The rodeo queen gazed down her too-perfect nose. “Gone. Maybe Gil’s little farrier knows where he went. She threw herself at him enough times when I hired her to shoe my stock.”

Liz blanched. “That’s not true.” Only no one listened, because Ginger had spied the sleepy-eyed Rusty, and everyone in the tent shed a discreet tear at the touching reunion of mother and son.

Rusty barely recognized his biological mother, but given his brother’s situation and the fact that his world had suddenly turned topsy-turvy, he reveled in the attention
the flame-haired woman seemed willing to lavish on him.

Standing a few feet away, Liz heard only concern in Ginger’s voice. If that concern was for real, how had the woman—the twins’ mother, after all—managed to stay away so long?

By midday Dustin had been in the well for longer than twenty-four hours, and in spite of the new bit, the rescue shaft had yet to reach his level. Time grew longer between his responses. Rescuers alternated between panic and fatigue. Gil looked and felt like death. As he hunted for Lizbeth, he heard vague rumors floating around about her prior run-ins with Ginger. But of course they’d both followed the rodeo. Coming upon Lizbeth suddenly, Gil grabbed her arm. “Why didn’t you tell me you already knew my charming ex-wife?”

Her heart thundering madly, Liz led the way into an empty tent. “You never asked,” she said lightly. “You knew I shoed horses for rodeo contestants. It’s not important, Gil. What’s important is that you need to eat. Stay here. I’ll run and get you something nourishing.”

Gil found himself shivering as he watched her hurry away. Probably exhaustion. It was typical of Lizbeth to worry about filling his stomach, but what he really needed was rest. Looking around, Gil spotted the children’s sleeping bags.

He was stretched out flat across both Melody’s and Rusty’s bedrolls, sound asleep, when Liz returned to the tent with his soup. Handing the bowl to a passerby, Liz lowered the tent flaps. Praying the crisis would be over when he awoke, Liz lovingly covered him with a spare blanket.

A shaft of sunlight winking in through a loosely tied tent flap awakened Gil. He rolled from beneath the covers,
pulled back the flap and was shocked to discover that the sun had swung into the west. Dropping back to the rumpled makeshift bed, he saw that someone had propped an afternoon newspaper there. As if he wanted to read other people’s hard-luck stories. Gil tensed and listened for the solid thunk of the drill. On hearing it, he relaxed and gave in to a yawn. The news headline caught his eye. Not too surprisingly, the well rescue had made the front page. Automatically Gil skimmed the first column—until he reached a paragraph that hinted at a love triangle between Lizbeth, Ginger and him.

Disgusted, Gil flung the paper as far as his aching arm could hurl it. “Damn Ginger.” She’d made him a laughingstock among his friends once. How dared she do it again—and in the middle of their son’s tragedy. And what about Lizbeth? Had
she
seen the paper? Gil stomped off to find her. One smile from her was all he needed before descending into that hellish pit once more.

Though he searched in all the usual places, he didn’t find her. It was Ginger he met up with, instead. Ginger and Rusty, looking cozy as two clams in a shell.

“Hello, Gil.” She smiled and took Rusty’s hand. “Why are you scowling? They’re making wonderful progress. Two more feet, that nice Mr. Jarvis said. Then it only needs a ten-foot cut across to the shaft Dustin’s in, and our family will be reunited.”

Gil started to say they weren’t a family and never would be, but something in Russell’s wan face made him ask, “Where did you lose Amistad?” Pouting prettily, Ginger brushed at her son’s shirt with nails polished a bright red. “With one of his floozies. It’s over between us, Gil. Has been ever since I caught him behind a chute making out with your little farrier. But that’s old news on the circuit. Ask anyone,” she said as
she sat cross-legged on the ground and pulled Rusty into her lap. “We all wondered where she’d run off to. Word got out, and people quit taking their horses to her. And then she ended up at the Lone Spur. Well, well.”

Heat exploded behind Gil’s tired eyes. Lizbeth had said she left shoeing horses at the rodeo to take the job Rafe offered because Melody needed roots. For no reason at all he remembered their weekend in Fort Worth. She hadn’t been shy when it came to lovemaking. Images tumbled around his sluggish brain. Lizbeth’s gentle touch. Her simple scent. Her open smile. “No,” he said, shaking his head. “If you found her with Avery, he forced her against her will.”

Ginger laughed. “Oh, Gilman, you are so gullible.”

“Dad?” Rusty hopped up and stood between the two adults. “Why are you yelling at my mom?” Gil caught his son close. The child’s body shook. “I’m so scared about Dusty.” Rusty’s voice quavered. “He’s been down there a long time, and he won’t talk to me no more. Please go get him, Dad.”

Gil hugged his son and met his ex-wife’s guileless smile. His stomach did a flip as Ginger pulled Rusty away and cradled him back in her arms. Dammit, something was wrong with this picture. Either that, or Ginger had changed. Was that even possible? But Gil didn’t have time to analyze it now. Rusty was right; his twin had been in the well too long.

Gazing down on the pair, Gil muttered darkly, “We’ll get Dustin, son. Before long, I hope. Why don’t you run and play with Melody? She looked pretty lonely the last time I saw her.”

Rusty settled more firmly on Ginger’s lap. “That’s okay, Dad. Mel’s got her mom. And now I got mine.”

Unable to respond, Gil was supremely glad when a stranger walked up just then and said Jarvis wanted him ASAP. Gil caught a glimpse of Lizbeth as he strode off. She appeared to be filling one of the large coffeemakers from a water barrel someone had trucked in. Because her back was to him and because the man had said Jarvis’s request sounded urgent, he decided not to stop now. He’d talk to her later.

“What’s up, Jarvis?” Gil asked, vaulting onto the platform.

“Good news and bad,” the stocky driller returned. “Good news is we’ve started the cut across—between the two shafts. The bad news is Dustin didn’t slip as far as we thought. From the soundings, it appears the pipe he’s in narrows. Doc’s afraid the kid’s circulation has been restricted.”

“You’re the expert. What do we do?” Gil murmured.

“I recommend making the cut as fast as possible. Jackhammers are the only way. One man down and one standing by. The air’s thin and the dust will be murder. Plus we gotta haul the waste rock outta there, else our crawl space will fill up. If a driller starts puking, I want him out of there like a shot.”

“I’ll go first,” Gil said, reaching for a lighted helmet and a mask. No one argued, but a hush fell over the stalwart drillers. They were close, yet still so far from rescue. Not a miner present relished spending time in a stifling manhole—the nearly airless runway between two shafts.

Liz knew some change had taken place. No longer did the whump, whump of the bit drilling into the rock ring out across the valley. She left her post at the coffeemaker and worked her way through the milling throng to the rescue site. She saw only a flash of Gil being lowered
into the shaft. She felt a painful tightening around her heart. Last time she checked, he still slept fitfully. Though she’d wanted them to talk, she’d been reluctant to wake him. He needed his rest. But she’d thought he’d hunt her up when he did awaken. A wrong assumption obviously. The tightness in her chest made it almost impossible to breathe as the top of his hard hat disappeared completely. For a moment Liz felt trapped. Around her pulsed the horrifying smell of death. But no—Gil hadn’t gone into a chute with a crazed bull. And Dustin was alive.

Hands clenched, Liz forced her feet to cover the distance to the platform where there seemed to be a renewed surge of activity. “Are they getting close?” she breathlessly asked a muscled dirt-streaked driller who stood bent over, drinking in huge drafts of air.

“Close? That’s the hell of well rescues, ma’am. Close only counts when you got the kid—and the fool going after him—safe on the surface again.”

“Fool? Is his father going after him now?” Her fingers bit into his work-toughened arm.

“Naw. We’re barely into the cut. The hole won’t be very wide thanks to that cussed rock, so the guy Jarvis actually sends across to get the kid will have to be agile as a monkey and strong as an ox.”

Liz gazed at the huddle on the platform. To a man they were broad-shouldered and thick-chested. Some of them had arms bigger than her waist. She scanned the police and firemen, then the paramedics. They were all a sturdy lot. Presumably Jarvis knew what he was doing. He must have his man waiting in the wings. The acid in her stomach eased a little.

Looking around for Melody, Lizbeth saw Ginger Lawrence and Rusty Spencer. She smiled at him, but he
only edged closer to the woman in white. Liz frowned. Rusty wore his heart in his eyes and on his sleeve. What was in that woman’s head, building him up like this—leading him for a fall when this was over and she went away again.