Colton jerks his head at the wreck. “I’ll go.”
He skids down the side and I alternate between watching him and watching my back and our vehicle.
Colton does a quick check of the inside, then drags the body free. It’s the driver. With a shake of his head, he lets me know there’s nothing more to find.
Well, fuck. I’d been hoping to find them waiting for rescue, even though the odds were tiny. Now Reed and Ashley, the mine’s geologist and the one who tells people where to dig and set explosives, have been taken.
I glance behind me. That’s a lot of jungle to search, and possibly a whole lot of hostiles.
The rain starts up again, and the warm drops splash on my face. It slides under my collar and wets my undershirt. Give it a minute and I’ll be soaked through to my briefs. I’m starting to miss the dry heat of the desert. I think I’d rather bake my balls than be constantly damp.
Colton scrambles up the side. I reach out my hand to pull him onto the road. “I took photos.”
“Any tracks? A ransom note?” But if there was, he’d have already said.
He shakes his head, no doubt already doing the math on the area of the jungle, the number of possible bad guys and our chances of finding them alive. “No.”
CHAPTER6
Ashley
“The emeralds have disappearedin my mine,” the man who appears to be in charge says.
After banging on the door and demanding to be released, I was walked through the campsite. I took careful note of three buildings, and two tents that I passed before I was taken into what must be the boss’s quarters.
It’s a small building, and the front room is the office. He’s armed with a pistol and a knife. Everyone I’ve seen is armed. I’m trying to remember everything that I see. To pay attention so I can give Reed something to work with. But at the same time I’m freaking out, because we’ve been abducted by armed men.
They could be working alone, or they could be part of a much bigger gang.
I don’t want to ask too many questions. I want them to trust me.
I frown and pretend to be confused. “I’m not sure how I can help.”
“You find emeralds, that’s your job.” He jabs at the table.
It is, but the company I work for uses technology that this guy won’t have. We can go deeper and with less wasted digging because I study the rocks and the way the earth has folded over millennia.
“What kind of mining techniques do you use?” Some of the old mines scraped the vegetation away until they found the veins. Some of the really small mines are little more than holes in the side of the mountain.
“We dig. You tell us where to dig.”
“I’d be happy to look at the data if you show me your geological surveys and test holes.”
That creates a flurry of conversation and pisses people off. Some of them glare as they rest their hands on their preferred weapons.
It’s probably an illegal mine, meaning they don’t have a government license, so there are no surveys of any kind. No plan to rehabilitate the mine after. No safety. Nothing.
“No surveys. You will look at the mine.” He speaks English with an accent as though he learned it from someone who spoke English as a second language.
“I can, but your miners know what to search for.” Many of the locals know a lot about finding emeralds. But when the seams ran out, randomly digging, or setting explosives, to find the next one was time consuming and dangerous. I don’t want to be going into a mine that’s held up with wooden supports and a prayer.
“He was wrong. He is dead.”
I swallow, and my stomach hollows. Was that a threat? It felt like a threat.
He stares at me. “You understand?”
“It’s a process, mistakes hap—”
