Only 03 - Only You

another round of coughing and gasping as the men took a pull on the bottle, and then more silence.
    “Acey-deucey?” Bandanna Mike asked.
    Short Dog grunted.
    The sound of cards being shuffled carried in the stillness.
    Reno waited with the patience of a man whose life depended on it—and while he waited, he wished again that he had Caleb’s ability to move over terrain without making a sound. He would have given a great deal to slide up and cut Bandanna Mike’s dirty throat.
    For an hour Reno listened to the two outlaws argue over cards. Then he withdrew slowly, using the fitful wind to cover any sounds he might make.
    When Reno got back to camp, he circled around and came in from the back. Eve was waiting with the shotgun leveled and both barrels loaded. As soon as she saw him, she set down the gun andran to him. He wrapped her up in his arms and held on hard. When he finally released her, she watched him with eyes that read him too well.
    “Slater,” Eve said.
    It wasn’t a question.
    “Slater,” Reno confirmed. “He’s got two men guarding that little marshy meadow just below this one. The rest of his men are camped in the big meadow further down.”
    “What are we going to do?”
    “Hunt for gold, sugar girl.”
    “And then?”
    Reno smiled coldly. “Then I’m going to teach those boys about black powder.”
    And pray very hard that Cal, Wolfe, or Rafe is on the way.
    E VE waited at the point where the coyote hole came into the main tunnel. Reno’s work yesterday had widened the hole enough that he could squeeze through. It wasn’t comfortable, but it got the job done; it took him to the place where sixteen ingots had been buried centuries before.
    The sound of Reno crawling closer reassured Eve, but she still wanted to hear his voice. She flattened out on the floor of the tunnel and called out.
    “Reno? Is everything all right? I thought I heard something fall.”
    His answer came quickly, distorted by the curves of the wormhole he was crawling through.
    “Just me pushing junk out of the way,” he said.
    It was half the truth, but it was the only half Reno planned to tell Eve. The middle of the old tunnel was unstable as hell. Widening the coyote hole had triggered two small slides. Loose rock wasstill raining down. A real slide could come at any moment. The longer he spent in either tunnel or coyote hole, the greater the danger was.
    But Reno knew if he told Eve, she would insist on helping him get the gold out. He didn’t want her anywhere near the crumbling tunnels.
    In fact, he hadn’t wanted her anywhere near any part of the mine this time, but she had gone mulestubborn on him. In the end he had agreed that she could come into the mine, but only as far as the solid rock of the main tunnel went. After that, she was to stay put.
    “Stand back,” Reno said. Then he added wryly, knowing that standing wasn’t possible, “Crawl out of the way, gata. I’m coming through.”
    Eve pushed away from the opening that still looked too small to admit Reno’s broad shoulders. As she watched, two gold ingots appeared. They gleamed in the lantern light as though freshly poured.
    With a muscular twist of his body, Reno emerged from the small opening. His face was streaked with sweat and grit. So were his clothes. His weapons were clean, however. He had stacked them to one side of the coyote hole before he crawled in.
    Reno picked up a heavy ingot in each hand and placed them with the others he had retrieved.
    “Sixteen down and two to go,” Reno said, stretching.
    “Let me get th—”
    “ No. ”
    Reno heard the flat rejection in his voice and prayed Eve didn’t hear the fear for her safety that lay just beneath it. He forced himself to smile as he tilted her face up for a quick, hard kiss.
    “I’ll be back before you know it, with a gold bar in each hand.”
    Eve wanted to argue even though she knew it would be futile. Instead, she made herself smile as she brushed her fingertips over his lips.
    “Hurry back, sugar man,” she whispered.
    After Reno disappeared back into the coyote hole, Eve crouched by the black opening and prayed.
    She was still praying when she heard a rumbling, grinding sound. A burst of air gusted out from the mouth of the coyote hole, bringing with it a cloud of grit and the sound of rock rushing down.
    The coyote hole had collapsed.
    “Reno!” Eve yelled. “ Reno! ”
    Nothing came back to her but the gnashing sounds of rocks as they found a new place to