Page 24 of Riches Beyond Measure (Golden State Treasure #3)

Seventeen

Cord awoke suddenly, aware of his being bumped or jostled by something. It was pitch-dark, and the world was moving. His head ached, his ears rang. In fact, his whole body hurt.

Then he realized he couldn’t move his arms. A few seconds later, his thoughts became muddled, and he felt himself fading away.

The next time he surfaced, he was falling. Had he been hanging before, his head down? Shaking his head to clear it, the pain got bad enough he quit moving altogether.

He hit the ground hard when he fell, and a grunt of pain managed to escape, which made him realize his mouth was covered with something. He couldn’t see a thing, as the world around him remained pure black.

He heard another grunt. This one he thought to be female. Annie? Panic filled him as a thud, followed by another broke the silence. A door slammed, and the silence returned.

Utter silence. Utter darkness. He was bound. Tugging on his wrists, he realized then that he was both gagged and blindfolded. He lay on his right side on what felt like dirt.

Another door slammed. Someone groaned beside him. Forcing his stiff arms to move, he could tell he was bound tightly as he tried to reach for his face. After much effort, he ripped away the blindfold and gag. It was still pitch-black, but he could talk now.

“Annie?”

Another groan. She might be gagged, too.

He reached into his boot and pulled out the knife he kept there.

He sliced through the rope binding together his feet.

Cutting the ropes around his wrists took some time, but he managed it finally before crawling toward the groaning.

He fumbled around until he found the gag and pulled it away, already knowing it wasn’t Annie.

“Who is it?”

“It’s Thayne, Cord. Thanks...” Thayne’s words were clipped by his need to cough.

Cord was frantic to find Annie. He was sure she was here somewhere, probably Lock as well. He took a few seconds to set Thayne free, who rolled onto his side and sat up.

After a bit of searching, Cord found Lock and cut him free, but he was out cold. Cord’s hand came away wet when he removed Lock’s blindfold, blood likely. A head wound. But Lock was breathing steadily, so hopefully he’d regain consciousness soon.

Cord, too, had felt a nasty bump on his head. Thayne probably had one as well. He fought down fury as he crawled around the room, recalling those thuds he’d heard. Where had they come from?

At last he found Annie. Ever so gently he pulled the kerchiefs from her eyes and mouth, then unbound her hands and feet. She shifted after being set loose and moaned quietly.

“Annie, can you hear me? Are you all right?” Cord was fighting to keep his voice steady as he felt tears threaten to spill.

“Cord! What happened?”

He felt around her head and found a wicked bump on the back of her skull in almost the same place as his. Lock’s bump was on his forehead, bleeding. Thankfully, Cord felt no sticky, warm liquid on his head, nor on Annie’s.

Thayne moved to check on Lock. “Cord, Annie ... Lock’s still breathing.”

“Let’s pray he wakes up soon,” Cord said.

“My head hurts something awful,” she said, her voice sounding more like herself with every passing moment.

Cord drew a deep breath and let it out slowly, trying to get his bearings.

“I-I think I woke up for a minute when it all was happening. I’m not sure, but it felt like I was draped over a horse.

If that’s right, they must have moved us some distance away from where we were digging.

That no-good Hardy and his man Rombauer attacked us in our beds and then dragged us here . .. wherever that is.”

“They’re going to steal our treasure,” Thayne growled.

Maybe it was the rage or maybe just the noise, but Lock stirred.

“He’s waking up,” said Cord.

“Did you see where they took us?” Annie asked.

“All I remember is moving with my head hanging down,” Cord answered.

“Well, wherever we are, and however we got here, we need to find a way out.” Annie started moving forward. “Let’s spread out, see if we can figure out what kind of place this is. Maybe it’s a cabin with boarded-up windows.”

In the darkness, Annie bumped into Cord, and he realized she was on her hands and knees and had crawled right into him. He felt around until he got ahold of her, then found her mouth and kissed her. “You’re the best wife in the world,” he said, pulling back a bit.

Annie gave a tiny laugh. “This is a dirt floor, that much is for sure.” She pushed away from him. “I’ve come to a wall and ... the wall is dirt, too. Are we underground?”

Judging by the sound of it, Annie was feeling her way along the wall. Cord began crawling until he, too, found a wall. He kept moving along it, trying to gauge the total space of their black prison. Then he remembered Lock...

“Lock, how are you? Is your head still bleeding? If it is, take off your shirt and press it against the wound.”

“I think it’s stopped, Cord. Say, are you my uncle Cord now?”

The question put his mind at ease. “I married your aunt Annie, didn’t I? Sure, I’m your uncle.”

Lock said, “When we get out of here, will you teach me to play the piano someday?”

“Sure I will,” he replied, praying they’d all escape from wherever they were so he’d get the chance to teach Lock. “Michelle wants me to give piano lessons to the students. I took piano lessons myself, so I sort of know what to do.”

“Thanks, Uncle Cord. I can be your first student.”

Cord then came across what felt like stone steps. “I think we’re in an old root cellar,” he said to the others. He began feeling his way up the steps, eight in all. Reaching the top, he bumped his head against something solid, a roof of some kind. “Is there a cellar under Graham’s cabin?”

“I’m not sure,” Annie said, “but that Rombauer left the digging and wandered off several times. Maybe all his exploring was to locate a place suitable for a prison. Like a root cellar.”

Cord pushed up against what he figured to be the cellar’s wooden roof, for it sloped upward. It refused to budge.

“Annie, follow my voice to the steps and climb them to the top. I think I’ve found the door to the cellar.”

A few moments later, Annie reached his side at the top of the steps. “It’s narrower here than at the bottom of the steps.” She took a shaky breath. “So we were knocked out and thrown into a root cellar.”

“Seems that’s the crux of it,” said Cord. “The door is locked tight, but that won’t stop us. We’ll find a way out somehow.”

Cord’s arms came around her. “Let’s sit down for a spell. My knees are a bit wobbly. Maybe we should wait till morning. Even a little light through a crack in the door would be a big help. It’s hard to figure a way out of a pitch-black space.”

Annie rested her head against his chest. “Those low-down coyotes are right now stealing everything we found. But why? They can’t hope to get away with it?”

“Unless, like Lock, they dug up a hoard of gold we don’t know about.

Or it could be those artifacts we found are more valuable than we realize.

They might just hightail it back east, sell what they have, and disappear into the crowd in New York City.

Or maybe their plan is to board a ship and cross the ocean over to Europe.

” Cord gave a sigh. “Either way, it’s likely we’ll never see the two coyotes again. ”

He felt Annie tense up at the notion.

“What do you suppose artifacts of the conquistadors are worth in Spain ... including that picture at the ranch of Cortés himself, which could be the only one of its kind of him as a young man?”

“It makes me right furious even to think of it. All Hardy’s scolding about our being careful and digging just right. He only did that so he could be in on the treasure hunt when the whole time his aim was to take for himself what we found.”

“ Traitor is what that man is. Something about him made me question whether he could be trusted, but I ignored it and took the professor at his word.”

Cord nodded. “We all thought him to be sincere, what with his talk about California history and his vast knowledge of the past. I guess we put him on a pedestal because he’s a professor, well educated, figuring him to be an honest man. In the end, we’re lucky those two didn’t kill us.”

He wondered then just how sturdy the cellar was.

Were they stuck down here? Maybe Hardy thought, rather than kill them himself, he’d just lock them all in an old, deserted root cellar far away in the wilderness where no one would find them.

What if they weren’t able to get out of this hole in the ground.

They’d eventually starve or freeze to death, or both. It was only a matter of time.

Annie squeaked, and Cord realized he was crushing her. He relaxed his hold and said, “I say we all rest up until dawn when hopefully we’ll have enough light to find a way out of here.” He told the same to Thayne and Lock, who voiced their approval.

Of course, they had no idea what time it was. Cord couldn’t guess how long he’d been unconscious. For all he knew, it could be high noon right now!

“My head aches like mad,” Annie said, “and my knees want to give out. If we all sleep for an hour or two, we’ll have more energy to break out of this awful place.”

Slowly, Cord and Annie made their way down the stone steps to the cellar floor to try to get some sleep. He pulled Annie close. Going by their voices, the boys weren’t far away from them. Curling up on the dirt floor eased some of the pain.

When Cord woke up later, it was to pitch-dark.

“I’m feeling much better, Josh,” Tilda said, resting a hand on her still-flat belly. “I’m worried about Annie ... well, all of them. I expected the group to be back by now. I think we should ride out to the dig site. I got a bad feeling. Something’s not right.”

Josh, sitting at the breakfast table beside her, looked up with a sharp snap of his head. “Are you sure? Because nothing’s more important than taking care of you and our baby.”

With a smile, Tilda leaned over and kissed his cheek.

“Thank you, but you’re wrong. It’s a big wide world out there, and many things are just as important.

Maybe not more important to us, but still very important.

If I still felt the collywobbles in my belly, I wouldn’t suggest going along.

I’d say to go without me. But I think a ride in the fresh air would suit me fine.

Besides, Caroline misses her ma. I really did think she’d be back by now. ..”

“I know. I’m worried too. We can get to that MacKenzie claim by nightfall if we go now.”

Tilda jerked her chin in agreement. “I’ll pack some food and water for us. You go tell Zane and saddle the horses.”

“If you don’t let me out of this bed,” Ellie said, “I’m gonna tear this room apart with my bare hands.”

Brody frowned. “You sure you’re not having labor pains?”

Ellie growled.

Brody came closer, not one speck afraid of her.

She seemed to know it because she calmed down and said, “I’m not having any labor pains. You know I have two months before this baby is born. The pains scared me at first, but then you explained that they’re common and now I’m not scared anymore. And I haven’t had one for days.”

Finally he nodded. “All right. You can get up and return to your normal activities. You can—”

“Ride out to the dig site and see how they’re doing. Annie should be back by now. It was a week yesterday. She’d never stay away from Caroline for this long unless something’s preventing her. I’m worried, Brody.”

“Yeah, I’ve been expecting them back for two days now. I never thought they’d stay away from the ranch for so long.” He gave his head a little tilt and smiled. “I suppose a quiet ride on a gentle horse won’t hurt you none. Let’s go tell Josh we’ll be gone a couple of days.”

Ellie threw back the blanket, fully dressed.

He lowered his brows. “You’d already decided to go. You weren’t asking for my permission, were you?”

“No, I wasn’t. I was inviting you to go with me.”

They heard the door to the doctor’s office open. Brody groaned, knowing seeing a patient right now was sure to slow them down.

“Brody, can we talk to you?” Josh’s voice thundered up the stairs, but he didn’t come up. “Ellie too if she’s feeling up to coming down here. We’re gonna ride out to see how things are going with the treasure hunt.”

Brody headed downstairs. Ellie grabbed her boots and followed him.

They decided to take a wagon to give Ellie a gentler ride. The trail wasn’t wide enough all the way to the MacKenzie claim, but they’d unhitch the horses when they had to and ride on horseback the last stretch.