The Cowboy's Shadow Part 21

"I'll wait," Kyla said.

"Feel like telling me what happened?"

Kyla could not find a way to tell him, except to start at the very beginning.

"We drove to the house first," she said. "It's boarded up." Step by step, the way the miners worked in the rocks above, recalling the smallest details: the prints, the books, the bicycle tail light.

"Bike tail light?" Glenda gasped.

"I'll talk to the boys tomorrow," Neligh said. "Go on."

Murmurs of satisfaction floated on the down-canyon wind. The men had completed another step in the rescue process. Kyla told Neligh what she recalled of the final desperate moments, Whit's fast reaction when he realized Chase had a gun, the falling rocks.

"This can't be true," she said.

"Why not?"

"Physicians don't stalk people with guns. Doctors don't conceal a correct diagnosis so they can make money out of a silly resort. Whit says the resort will never happen. Chase tried to kill us, got himself killed, for a dumb idea."

Chase's footsteps, the strange scratching sound...Digging! Chase had tried to bring the ceiling rock down on their heads by undermining the rock on which it rested. He had caused the avalanche!

Neligh's ma.s.sive hand weighed on her shoulder. "Come with me a minute," he said.

"Something private." He led her six feet from Glenda's comforting presence.

"Interested in what was in Moira's chip?" he asked. Kyla nodded. "One negative, a photograph of Chase with a woman. Not Moira. Make's my flesh crawl just thinking about it. Any of his patients who saw that picture, they'd go looking for another doctor."

"Blackmail?"

"Looks like it. According to her friends in Vegas, she dreamed of being a legit singer, not a hooker. She blackmailed Chase into marriage, then into promoting Hole- in-Rock Resort, where she, as part owner, could be a headliner."

"There's no hole-in-rock anymore," Kyla said, looking beyond the half-buried truck. The avalanche had covered the landmark.

"Just as well the rock's gone. It attracted the wrong kind out here. Maybe someone will buy the place and get the ranch going."

"Whit says there's not enough water. Moira? No word?"

"Not a whisper. Like she vanished. But if she habitually took photographs like the one she had of Chase, one of those men would eventually decide to end her blackmail permanently."

"Coffee?" Glenda asked, thrusting a white cup into Kyla's hand without waiting for a reply. "Are Trace and Andy at home?" the sheriff asked.

"They wouldn't be left behind, so I made them superintendents of the camp stove.

The women's club will be here in a little while with sandwiches. It took an hour to get the grocery unlocked."

"I'll talk to those boys," Neligh said. "Where's the piece of the bike?"

"In Whit's truck."

Neligh stared at the pickup, his hands on his hips. "Best not jostle that truck the slightest bit. It's holding the whole d.a.m.n thing up."

He accepted a cup of coffee. "I want all the women and children out of the canyon once Whit's down. At dawn we'll bring Chase out, and we don't want more people than necessary suffering heeby-jeeby nightmares."

Kyla clutched the coffee, more for the warmth of the cup than to drink. A muted cheer came from someplace above. She stared hard into the night, and saw a long bundle lifted free of the shadows, dangling from a cable strung from one side of the canyon to the other. Agonizingly slow, an inch at a time. The dog scrambled out of the hole, into the glare of a spotlight. He whined, then barked at this unexpected levitation of his master.

A vehicle moved in the narrows, its red light flickering, turning the walls intermittently to blood.

"We're flying him to Reno," Mark said, her first hint that the mine crew had come down. "The Castor plane's standing by at the airport. Dr. Temple and Chase's nurse, Miss Flores, will go with him." Mark was telling her there was no room for her.

Plenty of s.p.a.ce for a ghost.Run, Jenny, run !

Kyla took a sip of coffee, but found it cold and bland.Whit's corrupted me .

Sumatra, New Guinea, Jamaica. A rather expensive habit for a student.

"Everybody back, behind the ambulance."

The basket litter slid into the ravine at a frightening angle, the dog slithering along, staying as close as possible, jumping from one rock to another. He set off small avalanches and the clatter reminded Kyla of other rocks. She concentrated on the red patches on the s.h.i.+rts of the ambulance crew, who staggered under the weight of the litter, their feet sinking ankle-deep in dry sand. Kyla walked to the rear of the ambulance to meet them, and not a soul reached a hand to stop her.

Everyone knows we're lovers.

"Whit?" He resembled a mummy, swaddled within the basket. His eyes opened, but with the darkness she could not tell if they focused on her.

"Hi," he whispered. A string of unintelligible words.

"Come away," Glenda said, pulling at her elbow.

"Someone get this d.a.m.n dog!" a man yelled.

"Here, Pooch," Kyla called. The stray leaned against her leg, shaking. Double doors slammed, the ambulance moved, a foot, a yard, many yards separating them.

And every person in the canyon knew that she and Whit were lovers. They would be expecting wedding announcements.

Just as well that Whit was not sensible. He would have called her Jenny.

"Glenda, could the boys take care of this dog?"

Chapter Fourteen.

Kyla hitched up her borrowed robe and let Glenda examine the backs of her legs.

The slight stiffness in her calves and thighs, Kyla had supposed, had come from sitting on damp ground. Until she had felt the sting of the water in the shower.

Glenda poked and prodded. Kyla wished she had dried her hair more thoroughly, for rivulets of water tickled her neck and chilled her back.

"Just bruises, I guess," Glenda said.

"When the avalanche started, Whit threw me against the rocks," Kyla said, only just now recalling the details of that moment.

Glenda jerked at the robe. "Kyla -- " very serious, a warning that a sisterly lecture was on its way "-- you're not contemplating marrying Whit?"

"He asked me, but I turned him down."

Glenda did not seem satisfied by this news. "I'm afraid, after what has happened, he will continue to press you," she said a bit pontifically. "Men and women who experience traumatic situations -- together that is -- often think they're in love, as a result of the shared experience. They believe no one else could possibly understand. These marriages are often troubled, because after the shock fades, they find they have little else in common."

"Sisterly or professional advice?" Kyla asked.

"Both," Glenda she said grimly. "I think you should go back to San Francisco. Or home, for a few weeks with Mom and Dad. There's nothing wrong with maintaining a casual, long-distance relations.h.i.+p -- "

The phone rang, and Glenda dashed down the hall. Kyla craned her head, trying to see the black and blue spot in the bathroom mirror. Upper right thigh and gluteus maximus. No bleeding. Time would take care of it. She might as well get dressed. But all her clean clothes were in her rucksack at the ranch.

"It was Dr. Temple," Glenda said, coming down the hall. "They've arrived at the hospital in Reno, Whit's as good as can be expected, and being prepared for surgery."

"Glenda, I can't simply vanish from Whit's life. He's hurt and it's partly my fault. If it hadn't been for me, he would have given up trying to find where Rod got hantavirus. We've spent the last week together. We've...said things." Lovers who have no other love, confident that their love-making would reach beyond perfection.

"You don't have to vanish. Stop in Reno, visit him in the hospital, but don't encourage him." Glenda grinned. "It's immaterial at the moment, because you won't go das.h.i.+ng off to Reno until I say so. You're car's at the ranch, and I won't even talk about taking you there until you've spent at least five hours in bed. Five hours minimum."

"I won't sleep a wink," Kyla protested. She opened the mini-blind. "See, its daylight. I'll lie down a bit, and you can take me out when the sun comes up."

Glenda touched her shoulder and whispered, "Kyla," and Kyla realized with a shock that she had fallen fast asleep...

"Whit!" Kyla sat up, fully awake in an instant.

"No. No news from the hospital. But a phone call. Someone -- " her voice dripped mystery "-- about the job you start on Monday."

"Can't be," Kyla muttered. "They don't know where I am." But she obediently padded down the hall, her right leg and hip objecting at every step.

"Kyla?" An excited voice. "Neil Walker here. Couldn't wait to talk, so I called your folks -- they gave me this number."

Neil Walker. High school nerd. His voice had matured beyond recognition, but he still spoke using as few p.r.o.nouns as possible.

"Just a minute," she said. She turned to Glenda. "How did you set this up?" she asked with more than just a little anger.

Glenda spread her arms and shook her head, protesting her innocence with wide eyes and parted lips.

"Neil, do you have something to do with my job?"

"Bay Bend Medical Supplies. Bought it two months ago. Kyla Rogers, right there on the temp list. Secretary's tracking down theater tickets, getting a box for Giants' games. Grand summer ahead, Kyla girl! Do the dating game should'a done in high school, but on a more luxurious budget. Including..." The words trailed off into a suggestive chuckle.

Kyla felt as if a rock had hit her on the head. "Neil."

"Come ASAP. Get reacquainted before Monday. What's your fave, weekends at the beach or in the mountains?"

"Neil." Stronger this time. "Hold on."

"Two months," he crowed. "Both late bloomers, Kyla, you and me. Work out every day, ski, mountain-bike in the summer. Do you bike?" He paused for a split second at the end of the question, giving her a chance to jump in.

"Neil, a friend of mine is in the hospital, badly hurt. I can't talk now, because I must find out how...I can't discuss this sensibly at the moment."

"Friend?" She heard a distinct gulp. "Male?"

"Yes."

"Serious?"

"I won't know until I phone the hospital. He was heading into surgery last we heard."

"I mean, are you serious about him? Engaged or anything?"

Monogamy. How was she to explain unmarried monogamy? Hadn't she and Whit promised, on the way home from Las Vegas? What did she feel for T. J. Whitaker?

More important, what did T. J. Whitaker feel for her?Run, Jenny.

"Just good friends."

"Don't do anything rash, Kyla. Give me a chance."

"I'll call you."

"Home phone!" he said frantically. "Write it down. And my e-mail address." Kyla scribbled on the note pad hanging beside the phone.

"Neil Walker," Glenda said with satisfaction as Kyla hung up. "Couldn't have happened at a better time."

"Speaking of time..."

"Just before eleven."

"Lend me a pair of jeans and take me to the ranch."

Kyla found Judith in a square, windowless room. She threw herself against the ample chest, hung on the wide shoulders, and enjoyed thirty seconds of Judith's comforting pats before she asked, "How's he doing?

"He's still got a foot, but how much good it will be -- " Judith shrugged, and Kyla nearly fell with the movement of her support. "The doctor said his boots saved him. They were stiff."

"New. He bought them in Carson City last week." Only last week? Kyla studied the warnings posted on the door leading to the intensive care unit. "When can I see him?"

"In a few days, when he's transferred to a regular room," Judith said softly. "I finally managed to get in touch with his parents, but they're in Canada -- "

"A few days!" Kyla cried. Every roadside marker had been a promise, a lessening of the miles that had spread when the ambulance pulled away. "I want to see him now."