In Too Deep (10 page)

Rafe stared at her for a long moment, frowning, his brow furrowed, then shook his head. “Nope, can't do it. I can let you explore, but I can't ever be happy about it.”

Knowing it was the best offer she was going to get, she said, “Well, then fine. Complain all you want. But let's try and pick our way around the wreckage and go into that small tunnel Seth was so excited about.” Julia picked up her torch, turned and sidled between two boulders, then climbed another one.

“I thought you found your fossils somewhere else.” Rafe stuck with her. “Why don't we go there instead of exploring new caves?”

“I want to see what Seth was talking about.” Julia clambered over shattered stone to her left, to see if there was a way through. “He said that last tunnel led to a cavern that was so beautiful, and he knew I was looking for fish fossils. There were some in there.”

“We already walked right past plenty of fine-looking rocks.”

Since he was mumbling, Julia decided not to respond. Complaining seemed to help him stick with the job. It must be a man thing.

She found a way over the pile of stones, slipping through a gap in the rocks, and after that her way was clear to a small opening.

“This place . . . it's hard to breathe.”

Julia stopped to look back when he muttered. He had a tighter squeeze than she did. For the first time, as Rafe scooted through the gap between the cave ceiling and the avalanche of rocks, Julia really looked at the collapsed cave. Oh, she'd looked at it before, thinking of how to get through it. But she hadn't really seen how ruined it was. The ceiling on one side had come down and with it piles of rock that almost filled what had been a good-sized space. She saw deep cracks in the ceiling on the side Rafe was squeezing through. Her throat tightened. Had all the stones finished falling? Would another cave-in close off the only way to the surface? They could get stuck in here.

The small cave entrance Seth had wanted to lead them through on the day Tracker Breach had attacked them wasn't blocked, mercifully. She was used to exploring and it didn't bother her to drop to her knees and crawl, but the idea of the roof collapsing behind her, blocking her way out . . . she whirled to face Rafe as he finished descending from the pile of rubble.

She didn't want to admit it, but she didn't think she could climb in that small tunnel. How wide were Rafe's shoulders? Seth had been prepared to rush right in, so he must have known he wouldn't get stuck. But Seth was crazy, or close to it. Rafe's shoulders were broad. While Rafe was lean, he was heavily muscled. He'd fit into this cave, at the entrance, crawling, but might the tunnel get narrower as they went deeper? Might they get stuck?

The room seemed to press down in a way that threatened to wring a whimper out of her.

Julia's chest was getting tight and it made her mad. She'd never been afraid in a cavern before. This was Rafe's fault.

Honesty forced her to admit that surviving a cave-in might be at least partly responsible. But it didn't force her to admit it out loud.

Julia had the impression of that tiny cave breathing on her. Hot breath. Like she'd be crawling into the mouth of a monster that wanted to swallow her whole. The only good thing about that was she was real certain Rafe would let her quit for the day.

There could be no doubt about that.

“Rafe, I'm thinking maybe we should wait until Seth can show us that cave. I'd like to bring Seth back down here.” She smiled. A fake smile if ever there was one.

“No.” Rafe got that stubborn look she was already learning how to work around. “We're not bringing Seth down yet. He needs time to . . .”

She thought she heard the monster's stomach rumbling and she snapped. She couldn't stand here by that maw another second. She'd convince Rafe they needed Seth once she was outside.

She dodged around Rafe and climbed up the pile of stones she'd just crossed. Going exactly the wrong way.

“Let's go to see Seth.” She spoke over her shoulder. If he couldn't hear, he could just follow along. She doubted he'd lag behind.

“No. I think it'd be a mistake.”

“Seth loves this cavern.” She had to lie on her belly and scoot between the rocks and the cracked ceiling, and she made short work of it. “I'm sure most of his troubles have to do with the war and that awful prisoner-of-war camp, and those drugs Tracker was feeding him.”

Julia got across the collapsed cave and rushed into the tunnel. Rafe didn't catch her and force her to look at him and talk this problem through. She took that to mean he supported leaving.

It was a long, quiet, quick march, but at last they were outside, stepping into their mountain valley. Cold sweat trickled down Julia's spine. It made her furious that she was developing a fear of the cavern. She refused to feel this way. She
had
to explore.

I just need a different exit, Lord. I can't stand to think of being trapped in there. That's not irrational fear. That's just caution. Wisdom. Good, common sense.

Calmer now, looking sideways at Rafe as she let him catch up and walk beside her, she said, “Do you really think it will hurt Seth?” She knew, if Rafe said yes, she couldn't ask.

Rafe rested a hand on her upper arm to stop her. He looked back and she saw him staring at the cave. “The reason Ethan married Audra was mostly to get her—and even more, her children—away from here.”

“Seth too, though.” Julia ran both hands into her hair. Her hair had sprung loose and she juggled a few pins around to better collect the always-scattered curls.

Nodding, Rafe said, “I was afraid at first he might run into that cave and stay there. We might never find him. But I don't think he'd do that. Not anymore.” He gave her a worried glance as if asking her what she thought.

It was the sweetest thing he'd ever done. Because of it, she took a few seconds to think before she answered. “I don't want to harm him. I know he's fragile and confused. I just, well . . .” She couldn't admit she was scared. Rafe would pounce on that like a hungry cougar. “I want to be careful, Rafe.”
Nothing wrong with admitting that, for heaven's sake.
“I don't like that collapsed room.” There, a little more truth.

Rafe turned back to stare at the cave entrance.

She tugged on his arm and it drew his attention to her. “What are you thinking?” A faint shudder shook him, and she wouldn't have known it if she hadn't been holding on tight. “You really hate it, don't you?”

Rafe's eyes fell closed for a long moment. Then he looked at her with a grim smile. “I hate it as much as I'd hate anything that did its best to kill my brother.”

“A cave doesn't have a
mind
. You're giving it a personality, like it's living and dangerous.”

Rafe slid his arm across her shoulders and turned her to look at him. “You know something?”

“What?”

“You're right. I am. That's how the cavern seems to me. Like it's alive and dangerous. Like it has evil intentions.”

“And to me,” Julia said, sliding her hands up his strong arms, “it feels like it could be a place that reveals the greatness of God.”

As she said it, she remembered her dream. She remembered the fossils she'd seen of fish and plant life that she thought could be from an ocean. “It's dangerous, but it's a place full of the majesty of creation, too. It's a shining testimony to God.”

Rafe breathed deeply, then said, “Okay, we'll ask Seth if he wants to go in. If he says yes, we'll bring him back with us. With the children away from here, he can't do much worse than just go in himself—and if he does, we'll just wait for him to come back. He isn't going to go in and just stay. My brother's not that crazy.”

The screams jerked Ethan out of a deep sleep. He was on his feet and in the hall before he was fully awake. He heard his wife rushing on her little bare feet right behind him.

He'd have pondered the wonder of having a barefoot woman in his bed if Seth's screams hadn't been at risk of waking the children.

“I'm burning! Rafe! Ethan! Help me!” Seth's arms blocked his eyes, then flew wide. Staring at nothing, Seth flailed and slapped at his neck and back and arms.

Trying to put out the fire.

It made Ethan heartsick.

Audra rushed around Ethan to get to the far side of the bed. Ethan beat her to Seth. Ducked the swinging fists. Grabbed Seth by his nightshirt.

“No, Ethan, don't.” Audra grabbed at Seth, but Ethan was quicker.

Dragging Seth off the bed with one hand, Ethan picked up a pitcher with his other and dumped water on Seth's face just as Seth hit the floor with a dull thud.

The screaming stopped.

Sputtering, and swiping at his dripping face, Seth shook his head. Touching his neck and shoulder, probably to make sure the fire was out, he blinked his eyes and looked up at Ethan.

“That was pure mean, Ethan Kincaid.” Audra came back to Ethan's side.

“No, it wasn't. Right, Seth?”

Seth's eyes, still puffy from sleep, blinked owlishly. Ethan grabbed a towel that he'd brought earlier, along with the water, for just this reason and tossed it at Seth.

Seth grabbed hold of the towel and started mopping his face. “Yep, put an end to the dream right quick. I appreciate it, Eth.”

“You didn't have to drag him off the bed.” Audra jammed her fists on her slender hips, and Ethan had the devil's own time looking away from her . . . her fists.

“There was no sense soaking the bed.”

“That's right, Audra. He did that last night. Pure nuisance changing sheets in the night.”

Audra crossed her arms across her chest and glared at Ethan.

He had the devil's own time looking away from her . . . her arms.

“He needs to be awakened gently.” Her little bare foot started tapping.

Ethan tore his eyes away from his very own wife and her adorable fists, arms, and feet. A wife he'd sworn to love and honor in a ceremony duly witnessed and blessed by God and man. A ceremony that gave him responsibilities . . . and rights.

Ethan forced himself to look down at Seth. “Reckon you were in a hurry to be awake, weren't you, little brother?”

Seth stood up and went to the chest in his room. “Yep. No sense tiptoeing around with a thing like that. Best to just get on with it.” Pulling out a dry nightshirt, Seth turned around and seemed to freeze at the sight of Audra, like maybe just now he was really fully waking up. “You shouldn't come in here in your nightgown.”

Ethan thought about throwing more water on Seth.

Audra gasped, looked down at herself, glared at Ethan, then rushed out of the room.

“Strange having a woman around the place,” Seth said, wiping at his head a few more times as he moved back to the bed.

“Stranger still having babies around,” Ethan said. He listened but there was no crying. Lily had been sleeping longer every night, and he held out hope she might make it till morning one of these times. Now, if only Seth would.

Seth smiled so wide that his teeth gleamed in the moonlight. “I think you made Audra mad. Best to go apologize.”

“I won't wake you up that way again if you say the word. I decided it was best.” Ethan didn't think his black eye showed in the dim light, but Seth had seen it sure enough in the daytime. Quieting Seth once or twice a night had gotten to be a pure nuisance.

“Sorry about the nightmares,” Seth said. “Wonder if they'll ever stop. I can move out of here if'n you want, Eth. I know I'm hard to have around.”

“Nope. Not yet. We've got a few more months before we have to get a house up on your homestead. I think you oughta be around people awhile longer. Maybe the nightmares'll stop and you'll be able to get on with building a home then.” Ethan brightened. “Hey, you oughta get a wife, too. It's a fine thing having a woman around.”

Seth's eyes narrowed thoughtfully, and the wildness that always gleamed in them when he woke up from a nightmare tamed a bit. “A wife? That seems like a bad idea.”

“Why? You need someone to cook for you, right?”

“I don't know exactly, but the thought of taking a wife just seems all wrong.”

“Well, since there aren't any women around for a hundred miles, it probably don't matter none anyway.”

Shrugging, Seth jerked his head toward the door. “Get on out now. And tell Audra you're sorry. Tomorrow I'll tell her I wanna be woke up like that every night.”

Ethan turned to leave. He began to look forward to apologizing before he was out the door.

His room was only about ten steps down the hallway, but he was almost running by the time he got there.

He swung open the door in time to see Audra climbing into bed. He closed the door behind him and hurried to get in on his own side.

“I'm sorry I upset you by waking Seth up that way.” True enough. He wasn't sorry he'd done it—just sorry she didn't like it.

She turned on her side, lifted herself up on one elbow to face him, and whispered, “We need to be gentle with him, Ethan.”

Ethan leaned closer, not one bit opposed to getting close enough to whisper. “But don't you think getting him out of the nightmare fast is better than being gentle?” Ethan forgot about maybe coaxing a good-night kiss or two out of his wife and asked, “Do you think he'll ever get over the dreams?”

Audra was still for a moment, then gave a tiny shrug. “Poor Seth,” she said with a frown.

Watching her lips turn down reminded Ethan that Seth was fine. Completely fine.

For a lunatic.

“Well, we can talk about a more . . . um, gentle way to, uh . . .” He kissed his wife.

Who kissed him back.

“I mean, we don't want him . . . um . . .” He snuck in another kiss.

He'd forgotten all about what had awakened him when he felt Audra push on his shoulders. It almost wrenched his muscles apart to ease back from her. He looked into her eyes. Such pretty blue eyes. Even in the darkened bedroom he knew that.

“We can't, Ethan.” Audra looked almost as if she regretted saying it.

“Sure we can.” He could be more careful with Seth, to make his wife happy. Even if Seth gave him a black eye every day for the rest of his life.

“No. I'm sorry.”

“We can't be nice to Seth?” It seemed to him that Audra had changed her opinion kind of sudden-like. “Okay, well, good then. We agree. I'll wake him up quick. And no sense soaking the bed, so dragging him onto the floor makes sense. Maybe tomorrow I'll drop a pillow on the floor first so he don't crack his head. Plus, he keeps trying to punch me, so I don't see any reason to stand there and take a beating while my brother is locked in a nightmare. So we'll keep doing it my way then.”

“Oh, I was talking about something else.”

Ethan raised up on his elbow. “Really? What?”

She didn't answer for too long. “We can be nice.”

“But you just said we can't.”

“I
meant
we can't . . . can't . . .” She fell silent.

A wife was a confusing critter. “Don't you think waking him up quick is a mercy?” Ethan rolled to his back and pulled his pretty little wife close enough so her head was cradled on his shoulder.

Audra's hand settled on his chest, right over his heart. It made him think of how much it hurt to care about someone. How much it had hurt to see Seth burned. How much better it was to float along through life without getting upset over every little thing, like taking a wife or taunting your badly burned little brother. That attitude had served him well. But Audra's hand was nice. Holding her was nice. He was tempted to care about her. And the temptation was about more than feelings. It was about holding her close. Being her husband in all ways.

Ethan was a master at not thinking about how he felt. Right now it took a lot of effort to crush the image of a few ways he could be her husband. Before he got his unruly thoughts under control, he had a few ideas that threatened to make him care for his wife something fierce.

“Go to sleep, darlin'.” Ethan gave her a kiss on the forehead and hugged her a little closer. “In the morning we'll ask Seth how he wants to wake up from his nightmares.”

After a few weeks of owning his own ranch, Ethan had his life down to a routine.

Seth screaming in the night—which had him tired to the bone.

A warm woman to share his bed, even if she didn't exactly share it
fully
—which was driving him out of his mind.

A crew of cowhands who mentioned Rafe way too often and had a better idea every time Ethan gave an order—which made him mad enough to want to punch every one of them.

It was a routine all right.

A routine that made him want to hit his head against something really hard.

A snort of what could be distress sounded from the stall right below him. It was the mare Ethan had ridden home. She was a game little thing, a thoroughbred. He'd bred her to a beauty of a stallion he'd found in California.

He pitched more straw down to make sure she had a soft bed for herself and the baby she was due to have soon.

From the restless look of her, soon was right now.

“Steele!” Ethan stabbed the pitchfork hard into the straw, swung down the ladder, and moved quietly to study the mare.

Steele came rushing in. “What's goin' on?”

Ethan heard the tone. Steele figured there was trouble Ethan couldn't handle. He clamped his jaw shut to hold back the irritation. As soon as he could trust himself, he smiled.

“Looks like there's a foal coming.” Ethan turned to his mare. He'd had her for a few years now and the sire was another thoroughbred. “It oughta be quite a baby.”

“I'll check her.” Steele reached for the gate to the stall just as hoofbeats sounded outside. They both turned to look through the big double doors of the barn to see Rafe riding into the ranch yard with Julia at his side.

“Good, glad to have him here. Rafe's a hand with horses.” Steele headed for the door.

Ethan clenched a fist. Then he gave the pretty black mare one more look. Satisfied he couldn't do anything right now except bother her, he went to greet his brother. Steele had already told Rafe what was going on.

“Have you got time to stay until the baby's born?” Steele asked as Ethan walked up.

Rafe looked at Julia. “It could take a while, honey.”

Rafe was asking permission.

Stunned, Ethan finally managed a real smile, instead of his handy fake one.

“I'm looking forward to a long visit with Audra,” Julia said, then looked eagerly at the house. “Taking a while suits me just fine.”

“You can stay the night if you have to.” Steele's invitation smacked of true worry for the horse—with only Ethan to help her deliver.

“It's almost time for the noon meal,” Ethan said. “Go on inside, Julia.”

As if he could have stopped her.

“Rafe, come and take a look at her. I've been keeping her locked up so she'd foal in the barn, but she's just getting started. I think there'll be time to eat.”

Ethan stood back and watched Rafe take over.

“How big was the stallion you bred her to?” Rafe went in the stall. The mare was lying down, looking calm enough to take a long nap. She turned her head and whickered at Rafe, but stayed down. He dropped to his knees by her belly and ran experienced hands over her.

“He was a big brute. And this is her first foal.” Ethan leaned on the top board of the stall, and Steele settled in beside him. No sense all of them trooping in to scare the mother.

Seth came into the barn to join them. “Hi, Rafe.”

Rafe looked up at Seth with a smile that didn't hide worried eyes. “You're looking good, Seth. Putting some meat on those bones.”