Now and Forever by Mary Connealy Read Free Book Online Page A

more thing about where to look than Bailey—none of the mountain men did, either. So Bailey wasn’t waiting, not even for the most knowledgeable men in the entire area.
    She noticed no one told her to stop. In fact, Nev was right on her heels. A glance back told her Sunrise was gaining on her, the same intent expression on Sunrise’s face that Bailey was sure was on her own, and beyond Sunrise, men raced to saddle up. All of them coming to search for a favorite son.
    Parson Ruskins’s head was bowed, but even that was only for a few seconds before he rushed for his horse, too.
    Bailey’s heart pounded as she faced forward and hunted for a way to get close to the edge of this poisonous rattlesnake of a river.

    They hobbled along, and it was mighty slow going.
    Tucker tried not to put all his weight on Shannon. Once they’d left the light of the cave entrance behind, the cup of fire and the touch of each other was all they had in the world except endless dark.
    “Do you think we’re heading uphill?” Shannon liked to have talking going all the time. Tucker didn’t really blame her. He felt like the mountain was pressing down on his head and shoulders, and he didn’t mind thinking about something else.
    “I just can’t tell. I do think the air is clean.” Tucker looked at the fire again. “I don’t feel any breeze, and the fire doesn’t lean or wobble like it would if it was drawn to air, which would mean an opening close by. But it’s fresh air—I think there must be a way to the outside.”
    “How long do you think we’ve been walking?”
    She’d asked the question with such regularity that Tucker began to think he might have an answer if only he’d known what time he woke up. Because she’d asked it every ten minutes since they’d set out walking. He could have set a watch by it.
    “About two hours.” And his leg, bent back at the knee, between him and Shannon, seemed to be finding new ways to make him wish his ma had just smothered him in the cradle.
    “Do you think we’ll have to spend another night down here?”
    That was a new one. All Tucker could think of to say was, “No. How would we know when it got to be night anyway? We’ll just keep going until we get out, no matter how long that is. If we get tired, we’ll stop and rest.” Except he was afraid that if he stopped, he might never get going again.
    So he wasn’t going to stop until he saw the sky.
    And then he saw something in the meager light cast by their makeshift lantern that wasn’t the sky, but it was the next best thing. “A rat’s nest, Shannon. Look!”
    She stopped. “Where? I hate rats.”
    Tucker laughed. “I didn’t tell you that so you’d run. And I doubt there’s a rat, anyway. It looks old.” He gestured with the cup at a little gouge in the narrow tunnel. “Let’s go closer.”
    As they moved on, her walking, him hopping, the tunnel opened into a cavern. Much bigger than the one they’d woken up in. Still no sky, but Tucker pulled in a deep breath for the first time in a while and looked around. The rat’s nest had been built right at the entrance to the cave.
    The little blue flame only lit it up enough to give Tucker a feeling of space. The walls were no longer within touching distance. Tucker wondered just how lost they could get in here.
    “I think we need to sit awhile.” He sure did. “We have to figure out what this room leads to. If there’s more than one tunnel off it, we’re going to have to decide which one to take. And maybe you can do some of that while I rest my leg.”
    Tucker saw a rock about knee-high, almost flat on top right ahead of him. He pointed at it, hopped forward, and sank onto it. Shannon let him go, but then didn’t scurry off to explore. She sat right down beside him. He liked thinking he had almost as much strength as she had.
    Of course, she’d half carried him this whole time, but that was beside the point.
    He set the little cup of blue fire on the rock. “How