face even though her heart was breaking. That was the strong, Comanche way, and she wanted Jared Colton to see that she was no weaker than he.
“You’re right, Jared,” She drew in a bracing breath and squared her shoulders. “What can I do to help?”
Jared glanced up the sloping ground to where Kerry’s mother was waiting with a group of people that had grown to large proportions in the past hour. “Just go back to your family and wait. We’ll take care of everything.” He looked down at her as another notion suddenly struck him. “Wait—there is something. If your husband is here, he could be a help. If he’d be willing to crawl down into the pipe and call to Peggy, she might respond to him. That would help us pinpoint her exact location.”
Bitter regret twisted deep in Kerry’s stomach. Damon wouldn’t be willing to send Peggy a birthday card, much less risk his life to save hers. She tried to swallow away the guilt and sorrow that she felt, not for herself, but for her innocent daughter.
“Uh, he’s…not around. But I could crawl into the pipe and call to Peggy,” she quickly suggested.
Jared shook his head. “It’s too deep and dangerous, Kerry. I don’t want to put you at risk.”
Her heart sank. “Oh well,” she said huskily. “Then I’m—uh, sorry, Jared. Because Peggy doesn’t have a father.”
Chapter Two
The next few hours were some of the hardest Jared had ever endured. For the sake of the little dove trapped beneath the ground, he was trying to focus all his mental ability on the rescue operation. Yet there was a small part of his thoughts that continually strayed to Kerry.
To learn that she was a single mother had knocked him for a loop. The Kerry WindWalker he remembered was the quiet, reserved waitress who’d worked seven or eight years ago at Woody’s Café. At that time he’d tried to get to know her personally, but she’d stubbornly kept the conversation between them to the same light exchange she used for all the customers in the homey little eating place. She’d had a reputation for being prim and proper and, in spite of Jared’s best efforts, she’d left Black Arrow with that same squeaky-clean standing.
Jared could only suppose that the years away from Black Arrow had changed her. Although there was one thing that remained the same, he thought ruefully. She had no man in her life. The fact that she’d been raising her daughter alone saddened him. Yet he had to confess there was a selfish part of him that was glad she wasn’t attached to some other man.
“Okay, Jared, that’s ten feet. Want me to go any deeper?”
Shaking away his thoughts, Jared looked up at Newt, a burly oilfield worker who was operating a large auger. This was the second hole that had been drilled into the ground near to the spot where Peggy was trapped. The first had failed to give Jared an entrance to reach her. After a long, careful study from inside the ground, coupled with the engineering blueprints he had of the original layout of the drainage pipes, he’d finally decided to try another, at a closer angle.
“No. That’s good. Hop out, Newt, and I’ll go down. Maybe this one will get me all the way back to her.”
Someone caught him by the arm and Jared glanced around to find Bram at his side. Having his brother here for support, even in the capacity of sheriff, helped him forget that he’d been at this for hours and that his body was now running on sheer adrenaline.
“Newt has reached the right depth,” he quickly explained to Bram. “I’m going down again.”
“What if you can’t get through this time, Jared?”
“I’ve got to,” Jared said grimly. “I’m afraid to drill any closer. From what I know about this network of pipes, Peggy probably has some space to crawl back and forth. I can’t risk drilling into an area where she might be.”
Bram let out a weary breath. “I know you’re right. But she’s been down there for hours now. The tunnel you’ve just now bored may not be any better than the last one.”
The desperation in Bram’s voice matched the feelings that Jared had been dealing with from the moment he’d spotted Peggy’s little footprints. He wouldn’t rest until that child was placed safely in her mother’s arms.
Jared lifted the hard hat from his sweaty head and shoved a weary hand through his damp hair. “Believe me, brother, I want to get her out just as badly as you do. So have a little confidence in me, will you? This time I’ll get in. I have to,” he said with steely determination. Glancing back over his shoulder, he scanned the crowd that had continued to grow throughout the evening. “Have you seen Kerry?”
“I talked to her about ten minutes ago. I explained that you were drilling again at another angle.”
“How was she doing?”
Bram’s tight grimace spoke volumes. “She’s holding herself together, but it’s pretty obvious she’s not far from collapsing. Her mother tells me that no one has been able to make her eat or drink anything since we’ve been out here.”
Just the thought of what she must be going through was enough to make Jared sick. “See what you and Gray can do with her,” Jared told him. “I’m going down. And I’m not coming up until I have Peggy with me. Even if it means I have to dig her out by hand!”
By now Newt had removed the steel auger from the newly drilled hole. Jared hurried toward the open cavity. Bram followed to snatch a hold on Jared’s shoulder before he could lower himself into the newly bored hole.
“Jared, you’re exhausted,” he pointed out. “You’ve already worked for hours. Let someone else go down. Let me. Or Gray.”
Shaking his head at his older brother’s plea, Jared said, “You’re the sheriff. You need to be out here where you can make sure everyone is safe and doing what they’re supposed to be doing. This town would be in chaos if it lost you.”
Jared’s offhand compliment put a twisted smile on Bram’s face. “This town survived a long time before I became sheriff and it’ll go on surviving once I’m no longer in office. But that’s not the issue. You’re about to fall over and Gray—”
“Doesn’t like to get his hands dirty,” Jared joked and winked. Then before Bram could try to dissuade him any further, he lowered himself into the ground.
Kerry was trying her best not to keep glancing at the small watch on her wrist, but each minute seemed to be crawling by as she and the rest of the hundred or more people around the excavation site waited for Jared to reappear and prayed that Peggy would be in his arms.
“Kerry, is there anything I can get for you? A sandwich? Or cold drink?”
Kerry looked around to see Christa, a co-worker at Liberty Bank, who’d also become a good friend. The tall, curvaceous blonde was two years younger than Kerry and had already gone through a traumatic divorce. Over the past months Kerry had been trying to help her young friend get through the trying ordeal. Now the tables were turned and Christa was here to lend Kerry what support she could.
Trying to smile, Kerry passed trembling fingers across her forehead. “No thanks, Christa. I tried to eat earlier, but everything just stuck in my throat.”
With a worried frown, Christa grabbed a folding
