Ghost Canyon (The John Decker Supernatural Thriller Series Book 7) Anthony Strong (popular romance novels .TXT) 📖

“Those wounds don’t look like a human made them. These unfortunate people were violently ripped open. Remind you of anything?”

“The search and rescue team member. Sasha Martin.”

“Precisely.”

“You think it’s the creature from the mine,” Fowler said.

“Yes.” Decker glanced at his watch, then looked at Fowler. “Did you speak to the ME’s office about my request to view her body?”

“I did. They performed the autopsy but haven’t released the remains yet. They’re holding them until we give permission.”

“Then that should be our next stop,” Decker said. “I’d like to compare the wounds on these people to those of Sasha Martin. If they match, it will rule out a regular animal attack.”

“What about the plate we ran?” Barnes asked. “Wagner Mitchell?”

“That will have to wait. This is more important.” Decker turned away from the bodies. “I’d like to go right now, if you don’t mind.”

The two FBI agents exchanged glances, then Barnes turned toward his car. “Come on, then. I’ll drive you. Afterward we can stop at In-N-Out and you can buy me a burger.”

“Fair enough,” Decker replied. He turned toward Fowler. “Want us to bring one back for you?”

“Nah.” Fowler shook his head. “After spending the last hour looking at the remains of those campers, I’m not sure I’m in the mood for ground meat.”

Chapter Forty-Two

The sun had dropped below the mountains and long shadows crept across the twilight landscape. Harlan Biggs looked around, peering nervously into the gathering darkness. It was two hours since the men went into the mine and there had been no sign of them since. Now Harlan sat on a boulder near the entrance, with Wagner on a similar rock on the opposite side. He wished they’d waited until the next morning to come out here, when there would be more hours of daylight available. But he hadn’t thought it would take this long to get the samples of gold ore out of the mine.

“What are they doing in there?” He asked, rubbing his hands together. The temperature was dropping. The weather forecast said it would get down to fifty degrees overnight. He didn’t want to be out here when it did. “I hope they didn’t get lost.”

“Me too,” Wagner replied. “It’s hard to find good labor.”

“Did you bring a spare flashlight?”

“Yeah. Two of them. They’re in the back of the truck. Why?”

“Because if those Mexicans don’t come back soon, you’ll have to go in and find them.”

“Like hell I will.” Wagner shook his head. “The whole point of using laborers was to avoid dealing with whatever is lurking in there ourselves.”

“Well, we need to do something. I don’t want to stand out here all night.”

“And you think I do?” Wagner let out a disgruntled huff. He stared into the sooty darkness beyond the mine entrance. “How much longer do you intend to wait before we give up on this?”

“I don’t know,” Harlan admitted. He was tempted to have Wagner drive him back to the hotel right now and retreat to his penthouse suite to regroup. But that would solve nothing, and the clock was still ticking. He had less than two weeks to renegotiate his deal with Oscar Rossi or end up as a piñata for the mobster’s goons. He couldn’t afford to waste time. “I sure wish we’d thought to give them two-way radios to keep in contact with us.”

“What good would that have done?” Wagner asked. “We couldn’t even get them to say anything in the truck, let alone over a radio.”

“It would be better than nothing.”

“And it’s moot. We didn’t give them radios, so it doesn’t matter.”

“Which brings us back to the question, what do we do now?”

“I guess we wait,” Wagner said. “We don’t have a choice.”

“That doesn’t work for me.” Harlan stood and fought his way back through the sagebrush toward the truck. The desert fell away into gloom on all sides. The flashlights were sitting in a cardboard box in the truck’s bed. He grabbed them and clicked one on. Playing the beam across the ground ahead of him, Harlan picked his way back to Wagner.

“Here,” he said, offering his general manager the second flashlight. “I brought this back for you.”

“I’m still not going inside that mine,” Wagner said, accepting the offering.

“Have you forgotten I’m your boss?”

“And have you forgotten that I can quit whenever I want. I’m your general manager, not a prospector. None of this is in my job description.”

“Would you rather work for Oscar Rossi?”

“No,” Wagner answered. “But I don’t want to go in there, either. Why don’t we just go back to the hotel and worry about this tomorrow? There are plenty of other workers. I’ll just round up a couple more.”

“And what if they come across their friends in there?” Harlan asked. “What if they find them dead?”

“Who cares as long as they find what we want?” Wagner said. “It’s not like they’ll run to the cops or anything. Not given their status as illegals.”

“Maybe.” Harlan still felt it would be a shame to waste an entire day. They were already here. But if the men didn’t come back, they would have no choice. He decided to compromise. “Why don’t we both go into the mine, just a little way, and see if we can find them.”

“How far are we talking?” Wagner asked, suspicious.

“I don’t know, far enough to see down the tunnel.”

“All right. But we’re only going a little past the entrance, no further. I’m not running around in there.”

“Deal.” Harlan took a step toward the mine entrance and shined his flashlight inside. “You go first.”

“Not likely, you’ll stay out here.”

“Fine. I’ll go first, but make sure you follow behind.” Harlan hesitated a moment, building his courage, then stepped past the support beams holding up the entrance. He moved slowly, sweeping the flashlight beam across the ground ahead of him. At his rear, he heard his general manager’s footfalls.

“It sure is black in here,” Wagner said. “How far inside the mine do you think the gold is?”

“Beats me,” Harlan