Out of Control by Mary Connealy

Author:Mary Connealy
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group
Published: 2011-08-24T15:05:25+00:00

CHAPTER

12

It went pitch-dark.

Rafe heard footsteps ahead, running in this black tunnel. Was it the man who had moved that rope and trapped Julia in the cavern? It sure could be.

How many sneaking strangers who liked caves could there be?

But who? And whoever it was, why did he want to harm Julia?

It had to be someone brave enough—or crazy enough—to run through a tunnel in the pitch-darkness.

Or did he have a lantern? He might have been far enough ahead that Rafe wouldn’t have known. Whether he had light or not, running in this tunnel spoke of either crazed recklessness or complete familiarity with this cave. Or both.

The ground sloped until Rafe was afraid he’d start sliding, fall forever. Inching along, Rafe tested each step, the memory of that eggshell-thin floor in the other cavern haunting him. He kept one hand on the wall to feel if the cave tunnel had any branches he couldn’t see.

Rafe thought of how long he’d lived in Colorado. He’d have told anyone that he knew the land around his ranch very well. He’d seen this mountain plenty of times—of course, the whole world was mountains in this part of Colorado. The trail he took to town was to the north, so he hadn’t done much riding this direction. But he knew the mountains. And he’d had no idea this one was any different than the others.

He paused over that thought. What if it wasn’t different? What if there were a lot of mountaintop valleys like this one? Rafe itched to find out. He hadn’t done enough exploring.

The fading footsteps suddenly stopped.

Rafe’s hand went to his revolver. He continued on. Maybe there was light ahead. Maybe this tunnel led through the mountain to the outside like the vent they’d entered the valley through.

Surely that was why the footsteps had stopped, because they’d gone outside, run into grass instead of clattering on stone.

The light never came. Rafe took each step slower, more cautiously. He had a sudden vision of the cavern floor shattered under Seth’s weight. Rafe took one more step and his toe hit a stone. It bounced, then bounced again, still moving along fast. Then suddenly silence.

Rafe froze.

Finally that stone hit a long, long way down. His knees wobbled, and he dropped as the stone bounced.

The dark of the cave suddenly pressed on him. The cold inside him was crushed by blackness, until he feared the ice would crack open and all his worst, most childish fears would explode free.

As he fought for control, he heard something that turned him aside from the encroaching panic. Something scratched. A sound so faint he thought he might be imagining it. On his hands and knees, he reached forward to find a ledge, just inches in front of him.

A ledge he knew dropped off forever. A ledge just in front of the path those running footsteps had taken. How had someone run across this? Impossible. But he’d have heard it if someone had fallen. And he’d come inches from falling himself.

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