A mine in Barratt County just didn’t seem like Newcomb’s kind of place. Not really. For one thing, it was too dirty. He was more the fastidious paper-pusher type, not the hiking through the brush type.
Driving the ERT van over that kind of rough terrain without screwing it up and turning the van over in the process? A bit surprising.
K.J. was a bit in shock that the van had fit through the broken mine entrance, as it was. The mines were notoriously narrow. She’d read something once about an explosion in one of the mines that had killed fourteen minors in the 1920s. The entrance had been so narrow, that no one could get in to rescue them in time, after the cave in near the entrance.
She shivered.
This was…a haunted place.
She took a careful look around the outside.
The entrance to the mine had been boarded over at one time, and it was just wide enough to get a modern van in now. But the boards were destroyed. She could see weathered remnants where she stood.
The light was fading. The sun would be setting very soon. Which would just complicate things even more. She didn’t dare use the flashlight she held. She did not want someone inside seeing her yet.
The entrance had caved in, widening the opening significantly. Otherwise, that van would not have fit.
Just inside the entrance, there were tunnels down an incline, she suspected.
She had been in similar mines in Value on three previous cases. She had studied the schematics, and researched how the mines had been built and operated. Even what kind of rock that would be down there. Most of the mines had the samegeneral layout. They had been built during the Twenties, when industrialization and efficiency were abig thing.
But in an abandoned mine like this, there were no guarantees.
She crept closer to the entrance and peered around a slab of limestone that had broken off. It provided just enough shelter. But the van was nowhere to be seen.
The entrance was wet, though. From recent rains. Water drained into the mines now. She suspected water had back then, too. Even more now, with the reservoir just a few miles up the road.
The reservoir sat on top of at least forty small mine entrances that had been flooded, as well as three incredibly tiny towns that had been ‘relocated’ to an area just south of Value, before the Garrity County line. Those towns hadn’t flourished after the relocation—they’d just sort of faded away. The area had been flooded by the WPA or public works department just after the Depression, forming the massive reservoir above.
If they went too far in, most likely they would be walking into water. She strongly suspected she knew what he planned to do. He was going to kill Madison in the mine.
And no one would ever find her. Her body would be washed away where no one had a hope of getting to.
Unless Major Crimes got to her first.
There were fresh tire tracks in the mud.
And K.J. had seen him pull in.
But that man probably knew these mines a lot better than she did.
He had known exactly where this mine entrance was. He had been here before. And with Major Crimes knowing he is behind all of this—the man had nothing left to lose. And all that did was make him even more dangerous.
A man responsible for over a hundred deaths. She suspected it was even more. She shivered.
She returned to the patrol unit. If she was going into that mine to get Madison out—she would need some supplies. It wasn’t like she carried too many in her trunk, but hallelujah—she hadherpatrol unit, still. She kept hers a bit better stocked than most. She and Brett were a bittech-heavycompared to some other teams—thanks to his closet-nerd tendencies. If it was law enforcement gadgetry, Brett wanted it. If what she thought were in there, worked…they just might come in handy.
Brett was such a tech nerd at times. One reason he liked to hang around the forensics lab. That, and she suspected he liked the ladies of the lab, as he called them. Or…Brett was just a great big flirt. That she missed like hell right now.
Brett was better at this kind of thing than she was.
Number one, she had a heavy-duty long-sleeved jacket that was waterproof. And she carried a seventy-five-foot rope. K.J. grabbed that and her black knit cap from the trunk. Finally, she had a pair of thin, but highly durable black gloves. They would allow her to grip rope or rock.
But for now…Brett’s little toys were going to come in very handy. The infrared illuminator and night vision and set would hopefully show her exactly where Newcomb had taken Madison. She’d have to use both hands to use it, but unless Newcomb had something similar, she might just have the advantage.
If nothing else, it would allow her to follow Newcomb in, without him being able to see her.
That was the best she was going to get.
