Raylene woke up cold, with a crick in her neck and her hair tangled on a piece of loose carpeting next to Gabe’s wheel well. She’d fallen asleep sometime during the night and couldn’t recall Gabe ever coming back after he’d gone outside for watch duty. The space next to her was empty.
She extended her arm and felt around, thinking he might’ve rolled closer to the other side. Of course, that was ridiculous, because the back of his SUV was about the width of a twin-size bed.
It took her a while to unhook her hair. When she finished, she sat up and tried to get her bearings. Everything was a little hazy—except the amazing sex. Sex that changed something between them. It had suddenly gone from recreational to deeply meaningful. Perhaps it had been happening all along, but last night she’d felt a definite shift in the universe. She’d like to say she’d been down this road before, but she hadn’t. As much as she’d cared for Lucky, their relationship had been puppy love, fraught with complications and her ultimate betrayal. Butch had always been her father’s pick, not hers. And all the lousy choices in between had been her desperate attempt to fill the gaping hole in her heart.
Gabe was different. She, on her own, had begun to heal that hollow place in her soul a little at a time, and she’d planned to keep at it until she was completely whole. She had herself for that. But Gabe had a way of filling everything else. He made her laugh, he made her feel beautiful, he made her feel clever. But most of all, he made her yearn for tomorrow and all the adventures it could bring.
And they had absolutely no future together. He’d built a life in Nugget, and she’d destroyed the one she’d had here.
“Morning.” Gabe twisted around in the driver’s seat.
“Have you been there all night?” She rubbed her eyes.
“Here and the water tower. I didn’t want to wake you.”
“I guess I’m pretty shitty on stakeouts.”
He flashed a sexy grin. “I wouldn’t say that.”
“No sign of him, huh?” She figured if the thief had shown up, Gabe would have had him tied up and begging for mercy by now.
“Nope.” He shook his head.
“What if he’s already gotten the gold?” The thought had weighed on her. There was nothing to say that someone else hadn’t succeeded where they’d failed.
Being the naysayer that he was, Gabe huffed out a breath and made that face he always made when she spoke of Levi’s Gold. But their phantom digger confirmed for her that it really did exist. Someone knew she was selling the property and wanted to get the treasure before it was too late.
“He…they…got exactly what you got. Nothing.”
“How do you know that, other than the fact that you don’t believe in the legend?”
“I don’t for sure, but it seems to me that the trench is too shallow and too even. Like whoever dug it knew where he was going and was just getting started.”
“Like he was digging a tunnel?”
“Yeah. I also think we would’ve seen more of a disturbance in the ground, where someone hefted out a box or whatever storage unit was used for the gold.”
For all she knew, Levi had simply buried the nuggets in the raw dirt. Still, for the kind of weight they were talking about, the thief would’ve needed something to transfer it from the ground. A wheelbarrow, wagon, even a backpack. There would’ve been some sort of markings in the dirt. But why hadn’t the thief come back to finish the job?
“Why do you think he didn’t return last night?”
Gabe shrugged. “Too cold, too dark, he had a date. Who knows?”
“He’s got to realize we’re onto him.”
“Another reason he may not have returned.” He brushed a strand of hair away from her eye, the gesture so tender it made her chest squeeze.
“You think he’s gone and not coming back?” she asked, trying not to let him distract her from the conversation.
“I don’t know, Ray. But we can’t surveil the place twenty-four seven.”
“That’s why I’ve got to find the gold today.”
He scrubbed his hand through whiskers that hadn’t been there the day before. “You mind if we shower and eat breakfast first?”
“No, and I have an errand to run.” Not exactly an errand, but she was leaving on Monday and needed to get it done. Sunday she planned to spend teaching Harper how to care for Gunner. Raylene also wanted to take the gelding out for one last ride before she left.
He didn’t ask about her so-called errand, which she was thankful for. Otherwise, he would’ve tried to talk her out of it.