The Treasure of Como Bluff Read online

  Table of Contents

  The Treasure of Como Bluff

  Copyright

  Praise for Alison Henderson

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  A word about the author...

  Thank you for purchasing this publication of The Wild Rose Press, Inc.

  The Treasure of Como Bluff

  by

  Alison Henderson

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.

  The Treasure of Como Bluff

  COPYRIGHT © 2012 by Alison Henderson

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or The Wild Rose Press, Inc. except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  Contact Information: [email protected]

  Cover Art by Tina Lynn Stout

  The Wild Rose Press, Inc.

  PO Box 708

  Adams Basin, NY 14410-0708

  Visit us at www.thewildrosepress.com

  Publishing History

  First Cactus Rose Edition, 2012

  Digital ISBN 978-1-61217-546-1

  Published in the United States of America

  Praise for Alison Henderson

  HARVEST OF DREAMS

  “This is the first time I have read Alison Henderson but it definitely won't be the last. She writes from a view that has you inside her stories, living the lives and feeling the emotions.”

  ~Happily Ever After Reviews (5 Teacups)

  ~*~

  A MAN LIKE THAT

  “I finished this in one night, because I had to know what was going to happen. I even cried a few times along the way as I felt for the characters with what they were going through.”

  ~The One Hundred Romances Project (5 Stars)

  Dedication

  To Mike, who always keeps me on my toes.

  Chapter One

  Como Bluff, Wyoming

  July 1879

  Kaboom! The ground shook, and Caroline Hubbard stumbled to regain her balance. Ears ringing from the blast, she glanced across the rocky, barren landscape and spotted a plume of gray dust rising against the blazing azure sky. Horseapples! If those scalawags on the next ridge persisted in making a mockery of science with their dynamite, she’d have to work faster.

  She skittered down the makeshift path that crisscrossed the face of the bluff, knocking loose a shower of pebbles in her wake. As she neared the valley floor, she noticed a dark form slouched in a patch of scruffy weeds several yards away. Had one of those bone thieves come to spy on her?

  She marched toward the figure, hands balled into fists. “You’d better get away from here,” she shouted. “This is my claim, and you know it.”

  The form didn’t respond or move. As she approached, she made out a jumble of arms and legs. Bile rose in her throat. It was a man all right, and he appeared to be dead.

  “Hey, mister,” she called. Still no movement, so she ventured closer. A shock of smooth, dark hair fell across his face obscuring his features, but he wore good quality clothes, too good for a railway worker. What was a well-dressed man doing out here without a horse? The dirt around him was disturbed by dozens of hoof prints. A bloody rock and the mutilated body of a rattlesnake nearby told the tale.

  She knelt and brushed the man’s hair aside. It slid through her fingers like heavy silk, revealing a deeply tanned face with rugged features and a square jaw with a cleft chin. There was no sign of death’s pallor and no odor of decay despite the heat. Caroline rested her hand against his chest to check for signs of respiration but felt no movement. Her stomach rolled uneasily. She was used to dealing with the remains of creatures that had been dead for millennia. She’d never faced a fresh body before.

  When she withdrew her hand, something in the man’s coat crackled. Paper? Perhaps it would help identify him. Someone somewhere would want to know of his death. She reached inside his breast pocket and pulled out a small leather pouch, a wad of bills, and an envelope. Her jaw dropped after a quick count indicated the stranger carried over fifteen hundred dollars. Who was this man?

  She set the money aside and turned her attention to the envelope. Perhaps it contained a clue. Covered with creases, the envelope looked as though it had been crumpled then smoothed again, perhaps more than once. Turning it, she saw it was addressed to a Mr. Nicholas Bancroft in San Francisco.

  She gazed at the man’s face. Are you Nicholas Bancroft? She needed to know. The envelope was already slit, so she removed the letter and read:

  16 February, 1879

  My Dearest Nicholas,

  Mere words cannot express my delight that Papa has at last consented to our marriage. Now we will no longer be forced by circumspection to hide our deepest feelings. I long, as I know you must, for the day our hearts will be joined as one.

  I wish you did not have to make this last voyage. Keep well until we are together again, my dear one, safe in the knowledge of my devotion.

  Yours forever,

  Lucinda

  She glanced back at the man’s still features, and her eyes smarted with the sting of incipient tears. He was so young, and it was so sad. If the man was Nicholas Bancroft, hundreds of miles away a woman waited for him, and all Caroline could do was return a body. From the letter, it appeared he was soon to be married, or perhaps the happy event had already taken place. His Lucinda would be devastated by the news of his death.

  She folded the letter and started to return it to the envelope, but something blocked the way. When she turned the envelope upside down, a graceful silver locket on a delicate chain fell out. A love token, perhaps? A well-bred young lady would doubtless refrain from further invasion of a dead man’s privacy, but well-bred young ladies often missed important information.

  Caroline opened the clasp and sucked in a quick breath. Her brows pinched together as she studied the pale blond hair, heart-shaped face, and pointed chin of the woman in the tiny photograph. It was like looking in an imperfect mirror. Was this Lucinda? Despite the heat, a shiver danced down her spine. She snapped the locket closed, returned everything to the envelope, and stuffed it inside the man’s coat pocket.

  Back to the problem at hand. What was she going to do with him? If she were still in New York, she would call the police, but there were no police in Como Bluff—only the sheriff, and his office was miles away in town. By the time she persuaded Jasper to carry her all that distance and back, this man would be buzzard bait.

  Another explosion rocked the air, and she shot a glance at her mule. He hadn’t moved, but he stared at her with his ears at attention and his eyes bugging out like billiard balls. It was not a good sign. At his best, Jasper was hard to manage. Scared, he was impossible.

  “Everything’s fine,” she said in as calm a voice as she could muster. She’d better get moving before he bolted, leaving her to drag the body all the way back to the cabin herself.

  The mule snorted and jerked at his tether.

  “Jasper, be still,” she ordered, knowing full well he would do whatever suited him.

  She turned back to the body of the man she now thought of as Nicholas Bancroft. Sh
e wished she’d seen him in life, bursting with vitality. His body was strong and well made, and he had such beautiful hair, coffee brown with faint red highlights, as if he’d spent a great deal of time in the sun. Unable to resist one last touch, she brushed it back again, revealing an egg-sized lump on his forehead with a jagged cut oozing blood. That must have been the result of the blow that killed him.

  Wait a minute. Dead bodies don’t bleed.

  Caroline pressed her fingers to the side of his neck and felt a pulse, faint and thready but definitely there. Her heart skipped a beat. The man was alive. He must have been knocked unconscious by the blow to his head. At least she could postpone worrying about what to do with his body and concentrate on keeping him alive.

  She jumped up, ran to Jasper, and untied his tether. The travois she used for transporting fossil specimens lay on the ground. She attached the poles to the strips of leather hanging from her saddle and gave a tug on the mule’s reins.

  “Come on, boy.” Jasper didn’t move. Caroline huffed in exasperation, reached into her pocket, and removed a shriveled carrot. She tried to remember to bring one every day, just in case. Jasper grasped it with his velvety lips, and the carrot disappeared.

  “Now, let’s go.” This time when she jerked the reins, he followed, the picture of innocence.

  A summer of hard physical labor had built her strength, but moving the injured stranger wasn’t easy. She maneuvered him onto a blanket with great care and dragged it to the travois, where she secured him with leather straps as if he were a Diplodocus femur.

  An hour later they reached the tiny, ramshackle cabin she’d rented from the railroad, and twenty minutes after that, the man lay stretched on the rough plank floor of the main room, his head resting on a half-empty sack of flour. Caroline collapsed on a stool, puffing like a steam locomotive, and regarded her unexpected visitor. What to do next? She supposed she should attempt to ascertain the extent of his injuries. The bump on his head was obvious, but he might have other injuries hidden beneath his fancy clothes.

  First came the question of how to remove the knee-length black coat that fit his frame like a custom made glove. As she struggled to push the sleeves down his arms, a very unladylike word slipped out under her breath. Who wore a coat like that in this withering heat, anyway, an undertaker?

  Fearful of aggravating his injuries, she retrieved a pair of shears and cut the garment from his arms and shoulders. It was too hot to wear something like that, anyway, she reasoned. Underneath, his shirt was wrinkled and none too white, but she was pleased to see it free of blood stains. However, there remained the issue of bone, muscle, or internal injuries, and the only way to determine those was a thorough physical examination.

  Caroline hesitated as she considered the form sprawled on her floor. Although she had no medical training, she was well versed in anatomy, particularly skeletal anatomy. If only he were an ancient sauropod...

  But he wasn’t. He was a man, and if she intended to examine him, she needed to remove more of his clothes. If she cut them off, he’d have nothing to wear but a blanket when he woke up—assuming he did wake up—so she dismissed that option. It was one thing to examine a man’s unconscious body as a scientist but another altogether to have him wandering around unclothed. The sheriff and good citizens of Como Bluff already considered her unconventional as a single female paleontologist. If word got around she was keeping a naked man in the house, she’d be run out of town on a rail.

  As she unbuttoned his shirt, she struggled to ignore the hard warmth of his chest beneath her fingers. Nothing more than a healthy set of pectoral muscles. But they were more than healthy; they were magnificent. Firm, broad, and sculpted. Much like the marble torsos of Greek and Roman athletes she’d studied in art class in college.

  She chastised herself for such a fanciful notion. The man’s life was at risk, for heaven’s sake, and here she was carrying on like the kind of silly twit she’d always disdained.

  She slid her hands up and down his arms checking for displacement of the bones or joints. Happily, they felt solid and straight without fracture or dislocation. Even relaxed, his muscles were long and hard and spoke of work that belied his expensive clothing. The thickened skin on his hands bore additional witness to a life of labor. Nicholas Bancroft was a man of mystery. The more she learned about him, the less she knew.

  She finished her inspection, and satisfied he had suffered no major injuries to the upper body, Caroline scooted to his feet and considered the prospect of removing his boots. She tugged the right one, but it didn’t budge. Fifteen minutes of wiggling and yanking later, she had stripped him to his long johns and heavy wool socks. Damp hair clung to her forehead, and she blew it away with a puff. Undressing a man was hot, sweaty work.

  Although she had examined his arms and chest in the flesh, the territory below the belt was another matter. Since his long knit underwear showed no blood stains, it would remain in place. Caroline prided herself on being a detached, rational scientist, but she drew the line at a man’s waist. She hadn’t seen bare male legs in nearly twenty years, and her brother, Arthur’s skinny ten-year-old shins were no comparison to Nicholas Bancroft’s long, muscular limbs. She steadfastly refused to contemplate what else might lie beneath the dingy wool.

  Once she was satisfied he had no major broken bones and his knees and ankles articulated properly, she turned her attention to his forehead where blood still oozed from the gash in the center of the purplish lump. It was ugly, but growing up with a brother, she’d seen worse. Once she washed it, she would be able to tell whether it needed stitches or if a bandage would suffice.

  She rose, stretched, and massaged the growing ache in her lower back before collecting the bowl and pitcher from the table in the tiny adjacent bedroom. It had been a long day and promised to be much longer. Through the open front door, she gauged the sun hovering above the ridge of the bluff. In another half hour, it would drop below the horizon, and the temperature would blessedly fall with it.

  After filling the pitcher from the water barrel and pouring some into the bowl, she blotted the wound with a soft, damp cloth. Once the blood and dirt were gone, a jagged cut remained, and she had her answer. It definitely needed stitches.

  She’d never stitched human flesh before, but she’d watched their housekeeper sew up Arthur’s knee once. He’d screamed like a scalded cat. Thank goodness Nicholas Bancroft—if that was indeed his name—was out cold; she lacked Mrs. O’Rourke’s strength of arm and will. She fetched her sewing kit, threaded a needle with strong, black thread, took a deep breath, and swallowed hard.

  You can do this. It’s just like hemming a tea towel.

  Caroline winced when the needle pierced his skin, but he remained quiet and still. Only three stitches to go. When she stabbed him a second time, his eyes remained closed, but a soft moan escaped his lips. She swore and dropped the needle. After retrieving it, she held her breath and waited for a long moment. No movement.

  Only two stitches left. She bit her lip and stuck the needle in. His body twitched, and he groaned again.

  She yanked the thread taut. Hurry. Just one more stitch.

  She plunged the needle through his flesh and tightened the thread in one swift pull. She was just about to tie it off when his head moved, jerking the needle from her fingers. His eyes opened, and she found herself staring into a pair of deeply confused, midnight blue eyes.

  “Lucinda?”

  Horseapples!

  Chapter Two

  His pulse pounded behind his eyes, nearly blinding him as he squinted at the woman leaning over him. She was pretty—disheveled, but pretty. He thought he knew her but didn’t know why. He’d called her Lucinda, but who was Lucinda?

  “Mr. Bancroft?” The woman seemed to be talking to him.

  “Are you Nicholas Bancroft?” she repeated.

  Was he? It sounded familiar. “Maybe.”

  The question made his head hurt. Everything seemed indistinct, as if his brain we
re wrapped in cotton wool. His eyelids drifted down.

  “Sir.” The sharp edge of her voice jolted him back to consciousness. “Please try to stay awake.”

  “Mmmm,” he mumbled. “I’m trying.”

  His mouth was dust-dry and had a sharp, metallic taste. And his head... He raised his hand to the sharp, throbbing pain.

  “No, you mustn’t!” She grabbed his wrist. “You’ll tear open the stitches.”

  Stitches? A sense of panic seized him. “What the hell have you done to me? Where am I?” He struggled to rise, but she pushed him back with firm pressure on his shoulders.

  “If you promise not to move, I’ll answer what questions I can, although I’m afraid I don’t know much.”

  “You’re bound to know more than I do. You can start by telling me who you are.”

  She clasped her hands in her lap like a parson’s daughter in church. “My name is Caroline Hubbard.”

  Caroline. That didn’t sound right. He studied her through narrowed eyes. “Are you sure you’re not Lucinda?”

  “I’m sure.” A fleeting expression crossed her face before he could decipher it.

  Her name alone told him nothing. “Where am I?”

  She pursed her lips. “You are in my cabin near Como Bluff, Wyoming.”

  Wyoming. A wisp of a memory teased him then vanished, leaving him more frustrated. “How did I get here?”

  “I brought you. And with considerable difficulty, I might add.” She looked pleased with herself.

  “Why? Where was I before?”

  She blew out a breath, and the pale blond hair hanging over her forehead fluttered. “We’ll never get anywhere at this rate. I’ll tell you everything I know, and you can fill in the rest.”

  It sounded like a good place to start, but the conversation might be short since he had no idea what “the rest” was. If only the pounding in his temples would stop, maybe he’d be able to think straight.

  “I found you at the bottom of a steep hill in a clump of brush, unconscious, with a big bump on your head.”