Earthcore

Chapter One

Sonny McGuiness sat at a corner table, staring angrily at the longhaired Indian sitting across from him. The bar was dark with shadow despite the noonday sun that blazed on shuttered windows. They had the corner of the bar to themselves, not because there were only ten people in the place, but rather because both of them smelled as if they hadn't bathed in weeks. Sonny's shocking-white, unkempt beard framed a scowl that furrowed his deeply wrinkled, dark-black face. The skin around his eyes was somewhat lighter than the rest of his onyx complexion, a light chocolate color, giving him an odd reverse-mask appearance. He drank his beer as if it would douse his sudden burst of temper.

"Bullshit,” Sonny said. “You ain't found no Silver Spring."

"Hey, man, don't get hostile,” said the Indian. “You said you were a prospector, so I just thought I'd share a tale with you. You believe what you like, man.” He drawled out the word “man” so it sounded long, smooth, and mellow. The Indian sipped at his double shot of Red Star vodka.

The mention of the Silver Spring caused their first conversational pause in over an hour. Sonny had entered the bar planning to drink alone, as he usually did, when he spotted a man with a telltale head of long, straight, black hair. Sonny had introduced himself and bet a beer he could guess the Indian's tribe on the first try. The Indian's name was Dennis Diving-Bird. Most people, however, just called him Dennis the Deadhead. Dennis took the bet, Sonny guessed Hopi — Dennis bought the first round.

After forty years of prospecting in the American Southwest, Sonny prided himself on guessing any Native American's tribe. He liked Indians. They were, in fact, the only people he liked.

"The Silver Spring is just a myth,” Sonny said. “I should know, I looked for it twenty years ago and didn't find squat."

"Where'd you look?” Dennis asked.

"I looked in the Snake, Black, and San Francisco ranges.” Sonny finished his beer and signaled the bartender for another. “I didn't find nuthin'."

"Well, you were close,” Dennis said. He took a puff from the latest in his nonstop chain of Pall Malls. “It's in the Wah Wahs."

Dennis's wrinkled face hid under long, dirty-black hair. He wore a tie-dyed shirt, a fringed leather jacket covered with Grateful Dead skull patches, and smelled awful. But then again, Sonny knew that his two straight weeks in the Arizona foothills had fixed him with a rather ripe stench as well.

"The legends are true, man,” Dennis said. “That spring is bubbling out of the ground into a little pool full of silver dust."

"So you found the Silver Spring?” Sonny tried to sound disbelieving, but curiosity tickled his thoughts. “The legend is true, and it's just sittin’ there waitin’ for someone to claim it?"

"That's right, man. It's just layin’ there as pretty as you please, as long as no one's found it since I was there about ten years ago."

"Right. And that's why you're here, at the Two-Spoke Bar, drinking rotgut vodka instead of livin’ high on the hog at the Hilton."

"Hey, man, just ‘cause I didn't take it don't mean it ain't there."

"Then why the hell didjya leave it?” Sonny wasn't mad at Dennis, only at himself. The story was pure bullshit, yet already he felt that uncontrollable part of him embrace the tale the way a girl's legs wrap around her lover. Some men suffer addictions to drugs, booze, women, money; Sonny's habit was curiosity.

Dennis the Deadhead leaned forward conspiratorially, curling protectively around his drink, keeping his head low to the table. “That place is cursed, man. Maybe even evil."

"Aw, go fuck yourself! No curse ever stopped anyone from grabbin’ the pot at the end of the rainbow. I'd lift the devil's sack and pluck treasure from his ass, if that's what it took."

"That's ‘cause you ain't ever been there,” Dennis said softly. “The Hopi know enough to steer clear of that place. No one goes out there. No reason to go there in the first place. Nothing there but dirt and rock. I went out there to see for myself, to test the legends, you might say, but I only went once. The devil lives on that mountain. You can feel him, man."

Throughout the conversation, Dennis's eyes had sparkled with friendly laughter. Especially when he talked of the summers of ‘79 through ‘84, during which he'd toured with the Dead. Now, however, Sonny noted that Dennis's friendly emotion filtered away like wisps of smoke from his Pall Mall. As he spoke of the Silver Spring and the mountains, his eyes filled with fear. Every few seconds, Dennis looked from one corner of the bar to the next, as if the simple mention of the legend might summon some evil power.

"So if you know where this place is, how come you haven't told anybody?"

Dennis shrugged. “No one ever asked. Most people take one look at me and shy away. I can't remember the last time someone introduced themselves and offered to buy me a drink. In fact, I think you're the first."

Sonny nodded. “Yeah, but a secret like that burns a hole in a man's belly. If no one has found it yet, you haven't really told anyone. Why me?"

Dennis stared at Sonny long and hard.

"I don't know,” he said after a pause. His words were starting to slur slightly. “You're a man of the land. I can feel that. Maybe I told you because if you go there, I know you'll feel what I feel. Maybe because that place scares the shit out of me, and it won't scare you as much, maybe you can do something with it. Maybe it's because I'm getting drunk. Who knows?"

Dennis drained his vodka, his eyes flashing to both corners as he did.

"Could you draw me a map?” Sonny asked.

"Buy me another round of shots and I'll draw it right on this napkin,” Dennis said. “But I warn ya. You won't like that place."

Sonny signaled the bartender again, this time with two fingers for a double shot.

Dennis produced a red Crayola, and on the beer-stained napkin he started drawing a map. Their conversation continued for another hour, during which the two of them got exceedingly drunk, but Sonny wasn't really paying attention anymore. All he could think about was the possibility that the fabled Silver Spring — where silver poured from the ground like water from a bottomless canteen — was real.

Sonny wasn't some greenhorn straight off the bus. He knew the Southwest like a man knows his wife's body. He could hop in his Humvee, drive five or six hours to Utah, then hike into the Wah Wah Mountains and locate Dennis the Deadhead's mythical Silver Spring. The trip might take a day, perhaps two considering hiking speed in the unforgiving Wah Wahs. That wasn't much wasted time, and he'd satisfy his curiosity. He had to check it out. An ounce of truth lined every old wives’ tale, as his sainted mother used to tell him.

An ounce of truth sometimes paid off with an ounce of gold. Or in this case, an ounce of silver. Sonny wasn't going to be picky.

Chapter Two

Snow blew madly in a near-blinding wave, big wet clumps collecting on the windshield only to be swept away by the wipers. Wind drove at the night, the snow marking the wind's direction like tracer bullets. Connell leaned forward and squinted out the window. Visibility was only a few hundred feet. Rows of lights on either side of the winding driveway glowed with fuzzy halos of whipping snow.

"Maybe we should stay for a while, hon,” Cori said. “The party is still going strong. Although I wonder how long it will last without Mr. Life of the Party there to charm everyone.” Her hand reached out to touch his, which clung to the steering wheel in a white-knuckled grip. He threw her a glance, offering her a reassuring smile.

"Oh, I'm sure they'll find a way to celebrate without me,” Connell said, holding her hand for a moment. “Besides, I'd rather spend at least some of the first day of the new year with my wife, not a bunch of rowdy, drunken coworkers."

She smiled at him, that warm, melting smile that had caught his eye at a New Year's Eve party six years ago. Caught his eye and never let go. He grinned back.

"Don't worry, Pea,” Connell said, returning the smile. “We'll be fine.” The storm was getting worse, and he had no intention of spending the night at his boss's house, crashed out on the floor somewhere with passed-out coworkers scattered about like victims of some party land mine. This was New Year's Eve, after all, the anniversary of the night he'd met his wife. He would spend the night with her and her alone, in their bed.

Connell looked hard both to the left and to the right. He saw nothing through the almost solid swirl of snow. He pushed gently on the accelerator and eased the Lincoln out onto the road, tires crunching along the snow-covered driveway.

There was no squeal of brakes, no blaring horn, only the sudden smashing impact and the impossibly loud cries of screeching metal. The car lurched to the left, the back end swinging around on the wet, slushy pavement. The impact threw Connell against his seat belt so hard it cut off his breath. The Lincoln spun like a child's top, whipping almost a full 360 degrees as the back end flew into the ditch. Connell's head snapped back when the car crunched to a halt. As suddenly as it started, it ended, leaving complete silence except for the rapid clicking of ruined motors cooling in the night's grip.

Connell blinked, hands still clutching the steering wheel, trying to form a thought. A dull throb pulsed in his neck. A warm wetness and a sharp, stabbing pain rose up from his right knee. His mind finally centered on a single word: accident.

He turned to look at Cori. Faint light strayed from the lamps surrounding the driveway. The impact had devastated the passenger-side door, glass gone but for a few jagged shards, the once stately Lincoln now a mass of twisted metal, torn leather, and ripped fabric. The other car had smashed the door in so far that Cori was pushed almost to the middle of the seat. Snow blew in through the broken window, melting where it hit blood.

Her eyes were wide with shock and pain. Beautiful blond hair clung to her face, matted down with glistening red. Flecks of glass hung in her hair like glitter. Blood sheeted her scalp, her cheeks, her chin, falling to stain her white coat.

She looked at him, questioning terror written across her face. “Connell?” Something liquid and gurgling masked her smooth voice. She sounded weak, fractured.

Connell felt a stab of panic, a burst of blind rage. It didn't take a genius to see she would die if he didn't get help.

"Take it easy, Pea,” Connell said, his voice loud and ragged with fear and adrenaline. He fumbled with his seat belt. His hands were slick with blood.

"Connell?” she asked again in her fragile voice. Her eyes looked glassy, unfocused. She weakly lifted a bloody hand toward him.

He took her hand, feeling the movement of tiny broken bones under her skin.

It was already too late, and he knew it. He felt tears welling up; he fought them back. He held her ravaged hand against his cheek.

"I'm here, Pea. I'm here."

Her head lolled forward. Connell heard voices shouting over the whipping wind. Faces appeared around the car; coworkers and concerned friends peered in, asking if he was okay. His eyes remained fixed on his dead wife. Snow swept in around them, soft and silent.

He held her hand against his cheek — her warmth faded away; her hand slowly grew as cold as a fresh fish dropped on ice.

Connell lurched up, a scream locked in his throat. He was freezing — not from the dream-snow, but from sweat-soaked sheets turned icy by air conditioning running full blast.

He tried to control his ragged breathing. He never knew when the dream would come. Sometimes he'd have it for weeks on end, every night a reenactment of the terror and the loss. Sometimes he'd go months between the dreams, and then he'd feel a strange guilt at the possibility of getting over his wife's death.

But he knew better. He'd never get over it.

He sat on the edge of the filthy bed, on sheets that hadn't been changed in months. As he stared out into the black mess of the room, he knew that the car crash had taken his life as well.

His pulse slowly returned to normal, and he steadied his breathing, fighting down the stabbing pain of losing her yet again. He looked at the clock—4:17 a.m. He'd overslept. He dragged himself out of bed. He had work to do.

Chapter Three

Sonny stared at the tiny spring bubbling forth from the mountainside. It spilled cold water onto cracked rocks heated by the blistering Utah sun. Sonny's huge smile split his deep-black skin, revealing too-white false teeth.

Sometimes you just get lucky, Sonny thought. You spend your life hunting for gold and silver and a dozen other things, following up on leads, rumors, hunches, and myths and usually you get squat. For every valuable find discovered from such dream chasing, there were twenty or thirty hunts that turned up nothing but dirt. After a fruitless summer with nothing to show but blisters and a few new aches and pains; a summer spent researching dead and lost mines; a summer spent buried in libraries, city halls, university museums; a summer spent digging worthless dirt under the same sun in four different states; he stood there looking at the results of good old-fashioned dumb luck.

Dennis's map had proved amazingly accurate considering it was based on a ten-year-old memory. Those Hopis sure knew their land. The water spilled out of the rock, trickling slowly into an ages-old streambed.

Water was scarce in these parts, always had been, which should have made even a tiny spring like this a known landmark. But no one came here. He reached down to his belt and rubbed the Hopi Indian charm he'd bought specifically for this trip.

On his belt, opposite the Indian charm, hung his lucky pie tin. Tied to a short rope, it swayed from his belt like a six-shooter dangling from an outlaw's hip. He scooped up some silt, then swished it around in the tin, the motion carrying the fine silt over the edge to splash against the mountainside. After two minutes of panning, all that remained was a fine, white, metallic dust.

A whoop escaped his lips, a yell of joy that bounced off the mountain and into the dry summer air. He'd found it. Sonny pulled a small vial from his pocket, poured in the watery dust and sealed it tight. He carefully placed the vial in his chest pocket and buttoned it shut, giving it a proud little pat before covering up his tracks and any evidence of his visit. It had taken him six grueling hours of climbing and hiking to reach the spot, and the same return trip stood between him and his Humvee. After that, it was three miles worth of rough travel to reach anything resembling a road.

Sonny had found silver a couple of times in his career. The spring didn't contain enough dust to cover a summer's worth of prospecting, but that wasn't the way things worked anymore. Nowadays you made much more money finding the stuff and then selling the location to big companies. Let some mining corporation suck the minerals from the ground. Sonny, meanwhile, would spend the winter in Rio with some bronzed little piece of fluff a third his age bringing him drinks and keeping him warm at night.

Sonny was exultant. The chance encounter in an out-of-the-way bar and a small gesture of friendliness had combined to produce this find. Dennis's amazing story was grade-A, one-hundred-percent true.

While the find elated him, Sonny couldn't shake memories of Dennis's fearful, scanning eyes. That fear made Sonny nervous — because he felt something on that mountain, just as Dennis said he would. Sonny found himself hurrying down the slope faster than normal.

The Indians were so scared of the place they wouldn't even walk on this mountain, let alone approach the spring. He'd asked around, visiting all the Indians he knew in the area. Even the kids and the half-breeds, the ones who put little or no stock in the old faith, didn't come here. There was nothing but rocks, sand, and tough, scraggly trees — and the nearest town, Milford, was an hour away — but it still gave him the creepy-crawlies. As far as Sonny could divine, Dennis the Deadhead was the only Indian to visit this spot in at least a decade.

Sonny knew why. Most Indians, even the half-breeds, had an affinity for what the land had to say. After forty years in the desert, Sonny had that same affinity — and this place didn't have anything nice to say at all. This place spooked him in some intangible, eerie way. The rocks held a feeling that wasn't right, wasn't natural. Sonny wouldn't go so far as to call it a feeling of evil, but it sure as hell didn't make him warm and fuzzy inside. He'd never felt anything like it. It wasn't just the mountain, but what was on it.

Or rather, what wasn't on it.

There were no animals here. The Utah mountains teem with life if you know what to look for. Here, however, there was nothing; no birds flying overhead, no jackrabbit tracks, no rodents, no chewed branches or seed husks, no droppings of any kind. The place was still. Quiet. Uncomfortable.

After several hours of that creepy feeling tingling up his back, Sonny finally nailed down the vibe. It was the same dark, thick atmosphere that clings to a funeral. He understood why the Indians called the place cursed. He also understood why Dennis the Deadhead left it alone despite the obvious riches to be had. It didn't matter. He'd mapped the location extremely well and could give exact coordinates to the spring. He wouldn't have to come here again.

As darkness fell, Sonny finished up the long hike to the Humvee. He took a thirsty look at the blazing sunset, a picture that grew more and more beautiful as the years wore on. As he climbed into the Humvee, he felt a sense of relief that the mountain would soon be behind him. He patted his chest pocket one more time to make sure the vial was there. His leathery face split by a wide smile, Sonny headed for Salt Lake City.

Chapter Four

Salt Lake City looked so damn beautiful, a jewel against the breathtaking backdrop of the Wasatch Mountains. The view was heavenly — it was no wonder Brigham Young stopped his caravan some one hundred and fifty years ago and decided that this was the place for the Mormons to stake their claim.

The staking of claims was a big part of Utah's history, whether it was for land or minerals. Utah sucked untold fortunes from the earth: gold, iron ore, molybdenum, potash, magnesium. In the 1990s the state led the nation in beryllium and Gilsonite production. But as far back as Sonny could remember, platinum claims were not among Utah's fabled stories.

"Platinum?” Sonny asked, his face wrinkling incredulously under his now neatly trimmed beard. “You sure, Herb? I thought it was silver."

"Yes, I'm sure, Sonny,” Herbert Darker said in a conspiratorial whisper. Herbert was one of the few men that Sonny could look down at. Herbert stood all of five-foot-five, just a hair under Sonny's diminutive stature. They sat on opposite sides of a black lab table, the sample result printout lying between them. Herbert's eyes revealed his excitement over the find.

"It looks like a very rich source,” Herbert said. “The stuff you found is almost pure. That's unheard of. And one of the impurities is iridium, which is also valuable. This is an amazing find."

Sonny found himself whispering as well. “Are you telling me this is my biggest find yet? Bigger than the Jorgensson mine?"

"Well, it's the biggest find I've analyzed for you, anyway."

"Oh shut up, Herb,” Sonny said jokingly. “You know damn well you're the only one I let touch my samples for going on, what, fifteen years now?"

Herbert looked away for a second — away and down. Then just as quickly, he looked up, looked Sonny in the eye, and smiled. “Sixteen years, actually,” Herbert said. “I'm not an expert on platinum, but from what I've read—” his voice dropped to a breathless whisper, and Sonny strained to hear “—you may have the purest vein in the world."

Thirty minutes later, Herbert Darker sat in the privacy of his locked office, a stunning view of sunset over the Wasatch Mountains filling the room with amber light. He spoke into the phone, still whispering despite the fact that Sonny had left twenty minutes earlier.

"I'm telling you, Mr. Kirkland, this is big,” Herbert said, his hand cupped over the mouthpiece.

"Just tell me the ore grade, Herbert?” Connell said.

"I don't know. He didn't bring in an ore sample, just the dust he panned. For there to be that much dust and have it be that pure, it would have to come from a very concentrated source. There's no impurities, except for about thirty percent iridium, but that's almost as valuable as the platinum. If I had to guess, I'd say at least ten ounces per ton of ore, maybe higher."

"Bullshit, Herbert. There's no platinum vein that high.” The sound of Connell's cold tone always made Herbert nervous. He hated talking to the man, but Connell always paid so well.

"You think I don't know that?” Herbert said. “Why do you think I called you so quickly?” Tension gripped his body. Stress guided his every movement, making him fidget in his chair. His temples throbbed, as did the back of his neck. He knew he shouldn't have called Connell, but now it was too late.

He'd met Connell only once, mostly because the man rarely left his office, ruling the mining industry like some dark magician from his tower of doom. Connell was tall and lanky, just a hair over six-foot-four. His carriage gave off predatorial waves. He moved quickly, with a slight limp but little wasted motion, his black curly hair framing remorseless gray eyes.

"Okay,” Connell said. “Where did he get it?"

"Hell if I know. He's a crafty old bastard."

"How can you not know, Herbert? It's got to be in the area, right? I mean you're in Salt Lake City, and he came to you."

Herbert took a breath. The pain in his temples throbbed in time with his heartbeat. “He always comes to me. He does it so no one can guess the location of his finds."

A little more than a year earlier Sonny had discovered gold in Wyoming. The prospector carried the sample all the way to Salt Lake City, all the way to Darker, Inc., for analysis. The word is ‘trust,' Herbert thought. You're the only one he trusts, the only one. Now you're betraying that trust.

Connell's flat, no-nonsense voice grabbed Herbert's attention. “I need to talk to this man immediately. Give me his name and number."

"I can't do that!” Herbert heard himself whining, but he couldn't help it. “You have to wait. He's only been in town for a couple of days. He only found out about the platinum quality thirty minutes ago, for Christ's sake. He'd know I gave you the information!"

"You're a piece of work, you know that? You don't have any idea where he got it, it may be the richest find of the century, and now you're telling me I shouldn't call him?"

"But Mr. Kirkland, he'll know it was me! I could go to jail if he wanted to press charges."

"Oh don't be an idiot,” Connell said. “He couldn't prove anything, and there is nothing connecting you with us. I haven't got time for this bullshit. I need his number, and I need it now. Would an extra ten grand change your mind?"

Herbert fell silent. He could still back out and protect Sonny's find, at least for a while. Perhaps give Sonny time to properly sell the claim; Connell was ruthless and would find a way to own the site within days. Sonny might very well wind up with nothing.

"Okay, Herbert, you're playing hardball. My courier will deliver twenty-five grand to your hot little hands the moment I have a chat with this man. This is a one-time offer. I need a decision right now."

Herbert's head throbbed. So much money in one shot, but only if he served up Sonny on a plate. Connell didn't make idle threats; it was now or nothing.

"Well, thanks for wasting my time,” Connell said. “I'll get my information elsewhere."

"Wait!” Herbert said, hearing how loud he sounded in his quiet office. “I'll give it to you.” Herbert gave Connell the number. Even as he did it, he knew he was doing something wrong, but Connell would just find another way to get the information. Wrong or right, Herbert had already given up the goods on Sonny McGuiness. To not get anything out of that mistake was just plain bad business.

"You're a smart man, Herbert,” Connell said. “A very smart man. I also need any information you can give me on Sonny himself. What other sites has he discovered, and what companies does he usually work with?"

Herbert's jaw opened in astonishment. Connell had never asked for such details before.

"I… I can't tell you that."

"I want that information and I want it now, Herbert,” Connell said in a cold, detached voice. “Give me all the information you have on Sonny McGuiness. I'll double my offer. Fifty thousand dollars."

"But that information isn't part of the deal. The deal is I come across info on any big finds and I call you. That's it."

"The deal's changed,” Connell said. “You'll give me all the info right now, or you're out of the stable. No more payoffs."

Herbert felt his face growing red with anger. “You… you wouldn't do that! I've given you great information!"

"Don't be stupid, Herbert. You think you're the only one on the payroll? You think I do this shit for my health? I have a system, a system that gives me major finds, and if you're not part of that system, then you're out of that system."

Herbert paused, then clenched his teeth. His head felt hot. He knew he'd bitten off way more than he could chew this time. “I think I'll take my twenty-five thousand and call it finished, Mr. Kirkland."

This time it was Connell's turn to pause.

"It's a one-time offer,” he said finally. “When you're out, you're out for good. I want that information."

"I gave you his number."

"I won't forget this, Herbert."

Herbert swallowed and wiped sweat from his forehead. “I know that, Mr. Kirkland."

Herbert hung up the phone, then dropped his face into his hands. Guilt perched on Herbert's conscience like a buzzard on a coyote's carcass. He'd sold Sonny out. Just like that. And to Connell Kirkland, no less. Connell was not a nice person, to put it lightly, and he would stop at nothing to possess this find. In mining circles Connell's nickname was “Cutthroat."

Connell wanted this one, wanted it bad. Sonny was in deep shit. And Herbert knew he was the one to blame.

Connell's fingers drummed the desktop, ba-da-ba-bump, ba-da-ba-bump.

He hated Herbert Darker. He hated any whiner, and Herbert was a whiner of the highest degree. Business was business, and if you had to sell someone out to make money that's what you did. But you didn't whine about it, you didn't try to rationalize it, try to justify it in order to assuage your guilt.

Connell had dozens of agents performing the same task as Herbert Darker. He referred to the numerous informants as his “stable,” as if he were a pimp and the spies his whores. He'd created the network four years ago with only three people, two in America and one in South Africa. The system was illegal but profitable, and he'd gradually added to the roster. Now his stable encompassed twenty-seven geologists and environmental analysts from across the globe, all of whom knew that any potential find they reported to Connell would earn them a quick five grand.

Those calls usually amounted to nothing. Sometimes they were outright bullshit, people trying to scam him. The one thing — the only thing — he liked about Herbert Darker was that the man never tried to run a scam.

Herbert never called with low-grade sites, never called with finds that amounted to nothing, and never, ever called with erroneous data. Each time Connell took a call from Herbert, it merited special attention. Herbert triple-checked every sample, and on top of that often researched the site himself before calling.

This time, however, Herbert had called after only one test, and less than three hours after completing it. Very amateurish. Or at least it would be from anyone else. It meant Herbert had almost pissed himself from excitement. Ten ounces of platinum per ton of ore would do that to a fella.

If the numbers held true, the find would be by far the richest vein ever discovered. Connell smiled at Herbert's petty greed. The man risked jail and the destruction of his business for a lousy twenty-five grand when the platinum vein's worth might measure in the hundred-million range.

Connell paced his office, staring out his window on the fifty-sixth floor of the Renaissance Center building. It was dank and drizzly above the Detroit River, thick clouds blotting out the stars. His cheap suit itched. He ignored the distraction. He could afford far better clothing, better even than the custom-tailored affairs sported by EarthCore's other executives. Hell, by now he could probably afford almost anything, although he hadn't checked his bank statement in over two years. Connell had more important things to do with his time than spend it worrying about appearances.

He felt anxious. If this find was even half as big as Herbert Darker estimated, it would be one of the richest sites on the face of the planet. It would definitely be EarthCore's biggest asset. A sense of urgency filled him — any rival company that discovered the site would move fast to buy or lease the property. At the moment, Connell held the edge. He had to get to Sonny McGuiness and he had to get to him fast.

First, however, he had to inform the boss.

"Come in, sweetie,” Barbara Yakely said through thick cigar smoke as Connell entered her massive office. The office, and everything in it, had once belonged to Barbara's husband, Charles Yakely Jr. Since the plane crash that killed Charles Jr. and her son — Charles III — just over a decade ago, EarthCore and the big office belonged to her.

She gave Connell a warm smile. He was her favorite. Most thought that Connell had garnered her favor with his penchant for big-dollar digs, but it went much deeper than money and profit. They shared the unspoken void of true love lost to sudden, heart-ripping tragedy. She'd watched him change from a gregarious, wide-smiled person into a hard-faced, hard-hearted man. Once upon a time he'd been a familiar face to almost everyone in the company. In the last four years, however, he'd become nothing more than a voice on the phone to most employees, a voice of pure efficiency and power.

Efficiency was the key word, she reminded herself. Efficiency, and profitability.

"This better be important, sweetie,” Barbara said, her gravely voice holding a note of impatience.

"It's important.” Connell's features were expressionless, but then they always were. “We have a lead on something that could be big."

"How big?"

"How familiar are you with the platinum market?"

Barbara shrugged. EarthCore had no platinum interests, and as such she didn't concern herself with the subject.

"Prices have risen steadily for the last five years,” Connell said. “Ford introduced a new catalytic converter two years ago and hailed it as the next generation of pollution control. Their converters, each of which requires two ounces of platinum, are a revolutionary step in automobile pollution control. The system not only reduces pollution, but the air that leaves the car is cleaner than the air that goes in. No more pollution. No more smog. The end of the electric-car threat. The oil companies are nuts over the technology."

Barbara nodded. Ford's pollution-free cars sold faster than cigars at a Castro convention. The Lucid, the first model to come standard with the new converter, was last year's best-selling model.

"Every car maker in the industry is striving to duplicate the process,” Connell said. “Mercedes-Benz, Toyota, and Chevrolet are all releasing new models with the same technology. In two years, every new gas-powered car will have this feature — that's two ounces of platinum for each vehicle.

"And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Some estimate that twenty percent of goods manufactured today either contain platinum or are produced by equipment that contains platinum. It's in all types of things from eyeglasses to jet engines to medical equipment to crude-oil refining machinery. Industry uses the stuff for its conductivity, resistance to corrosion and high temperature resistance. In addition, it's the metal du jour of the computer industry. Use of platinum in computers has increased at least a thousand percent every year since 1994, a span of growth unprecedented since the introduction of silicon.

"Unlike silicon, however, platinum isn't cheap. With the continued computer industry push and its increased use in the auto industry, the demand is through the roof."

Barbara suppressed a smile of maternal pride. She wondered if there was any informational tidbit about the mining industry her Connell hadn't memorized.

He continued. “On top of the increased demand, there's a possible supply shortage coming soon. South Africa and Russia are the main producers of platinum ore. There are only two substantial platinum sources in America — Stillwater Mine in Montana and the Weaver Creek mine in Arizona. Unlike gold, which many banks stockpile to sell when prices rise, the only known platinum reserves are in the Russian states. They dumped most of it in the late nineties, and most analysts think the Russian reserves are practically gone. What this means is that the demand for platinum is soaring while supply is still in the ground. The price is currently stable at 850 dollars an ounce. South Africa controls the majority of supply, and they'll ration production to drive up the price. My research leads me to believe that the price will shoot above 925 dollars an ounce by this time next year, and should continue to rise."

Barbara rolled the cigar in her fingers. She knew from experience that Connell's business instincts bordered on the uncanny; if he smelled a profit, that was good enough for her.

"Ore grade for platinum is usually very low, in the range of one ounce platinum per ten tons ore. The Weaver Creek site surprised the world's mining community with one ounce per six tons of ore. Above that, Stillwater mine in Oklahoma makes unproven claims of eight-tenths of an ounce per single ton of ore.” Connell leaned forward, gripping the edge of her desk.

"We may be on to a site that possesses a vastly higher grade. In fact, we may be onto the richest platinum vein in history. I'm leaving tonight for Salt Lake City to talk to the prospector who discovered this site. I need to buy him now before a bidding war erupts. I want to use Kayla Meyers."

At the mention of that name, Barbara's smile faded.

"We discussed this, Connell. You agreed we weren't going to use her anymore."

Connell nodded. “That was then, this is now. I don't know if the prospector will play ball or not."

"So throw a gob of money at him,” Barbara said. “If your hunch is that strong, take a chance. I'll authorize a million."

Connell shrugged. “Don't know if that will be enough, Barbara. I figure we've only got one chance to get the location, and we have to get it now. If the prospector even has an inkling of how valuable this find may be, he won't even blink at a million. If I throw more money his way and he's smart, he'll contact every mining company in the world and negotiate a bigger deal."

"So what? Last time I checked, we were a very profitable company. We don't need Meyers — we can match any deal."

Connell nodded again. “True, but negotiations take time. You and I both know that with today's technology, one of the other companies may discover his site before we can close a deal. On top of that, if he starts making noise about a platinum find, the South Africans could get involved, so could the Russians, even the U.S. government. I want to keep this very, very quiet. I need to close the deal with the prospector immediately, before word gets out. In order to do that, I need to know everything about this man, and I need to know now. I have to hit the negotiation table fully armed."

Barbara shook her head. “Look, Connell, that woman is bad news. She put that Crittenden Mines employee in a wheelchair."

"She was acquitted."

"Of the criminal charge, but we're still holding the bag on the civil suit. I'm still trying to negotiate a decent settlement. Or have you forgot we're on the hook for $10 million in damages?"

"I haven't forgot the lawsuit, but don't forget the copper mine in Moyobamba, and the bauxite site in Queensland. How are those doing?"

Barbara grimaced. She hated it when Connell played the smart-ass. Both of the mines were huge profit centers for EarthCore.

"You know damn well how they're doing,” she said.

"And we wouldn't have those sites if I hadn't used Kayla Meyers. And what about O'Doyle? Remember the security problems we had before Kayla told me about him?"

Barbara nodded.

"She's the best there is,” Connell said. “I need information and I need it pronto. She's the only one who can deliver."

"I don't care about all that, she's bad news. She was kicked out of the NSA, for crying out loud, Connell. We got our money's worth out of her, but we're not using her again."

"But Barbara, this could be the richest find in history—"

"No! And that's final,” she said, pounding her fist on the desk. “You'll have to close the deal without her. I'll call accounting, set up two million for you to close this deal, but we're not using Meyers. Understand?"

Connell sighed and looked away, but nodded.

He walked out of the room. Barbara smiled and took a big puff of the cigar. So he'd stumbled onto the richest platinum vein in history, eh? Knowing Connell as she did, she wasn't the least bit surprised. She had faith in him — he could close the deal without using that psycho Meyers.

That woman was downright scary.

Chapter Five

At 2:15 a.m. and back in his office, Connell worked the phone yet again. A sleepy voice answered the other end of the line after seventeen rings. Sleepy, but clearly irritated.

Kayla's voice was too deep to belong to a woman, yet still somehow sounded feminine despite the torrent of obscenities it usually carried.

"This had better be damn good,” she said.

"This is Kirkland."

"Mr. Kirkland?” Respect was suddenly audible in her voice. Or maybe it was just greed. “I'm surprised to hear from you. How can I help you?"

"I need dirt on a man and I need it now,” Connell said. “The name is Sonny McGuiness. He's a prospector. Right now he's at the Salt Lake City Hilton.” He heard Kayla scribbling furiously.

"Permanent address or phone?"

"Don't know. He operates out of Salt Lake City and vacations in Rio. That's all I know."

"What else?"

"I said that's all I know."

"You've got to be shitting me."

"I shit you not, Ms. Meyers."

Kayla's tone of respect gave way to one of annoyance. “Mr. Kirkland, that's not much to go on."

"He has his samples analyzed at Darker Inc., a Salt Lake City company run by a man named Herbert Darker. Darker may be your best source for leads."

"You know the Darker guy?"

"Yes, he's in the stable.” Connell often gave Kayla information that he gave to no one else in the world, not even Barbara Yakely. Kayla was efficient, quiet, and trustworthy, although Connell was sure that would last only as long as he remained her top-paying client. She was a worthwhile investment; ex-National Security Agency operatives were tough to come by.

"Darker is on the payroll, so he'll cooperate?"

Connell thought on that for a moment. Herbert's illusion of morality might cause delays, and Connell didn't have time for delays.

"Correction. He was in the stable,” Connell said. “Do what you have to do, but get me that information. Just try and keep it under control this time, will you? No more putting people in wheelchairs."

"I understand,” Kayla said. He could hear the smile in her voice. He wondered what Herbert was in for, then decided he really didn't care. Darker had made his bed, now he'd have to sleep in it.

Better him than me, Connell thought. Dealing with Kayla Meyers seemed like dealing with the devil; sooner or later the tables would turn and you'd be on the receiving end of something painful and nasty. He wasn't afraid of her, but only because one has to give a damn about living to be afraid of death. None of that mattered — he really didn't care to know how she obtained the dirt on Sonny McGuiness, as long as she got it.

"I need this by tomorrow,” Connell said.

"Oh go fuck yourself, Kirkland! You can't ask for that and you know it. I'm in Washington, for fuck's sake. I have to do a computer search first and then probably fly to Salt Lake City. It's not going to happen."

"Kayla, this pays triple your usual fee. That's if I have something useful by 8:15 p.m. tomorrow. No excuses. Understand?"

Her normal $15,000 fee suddenly turned into a rush-order $45,000.

"Sure, Mr. Kirkland,” Kayla said, her voice tired but resigned. “I understand. 8:15 p.m. tomorrow."

Connell hung up without another word. He knew she'd find something, he just hoped it would be enough. He had to own McGuiness. Not only own him, he reminded himself, but make him part of the project. According to Herbert, Sonny knew the area's mining history better than any man alive. Such knowledge was vital to make things move quickly. Time was Connell's biggest enemy. Sooner or later word of the find would leak to the competition, but by then Connell intended to have the site locked up tight.

At 4:47 a.m., Kayla stared at the computer screen with bloodshot eyes. A recent DMV photo of Sonny McGuiness smiled back at her with his blazing white teeth and a beard that seemed electric against his pitch-black skin.

You're a real pain in the ass, Sonny-boy.

It had taken her well over an hour to dig up information on Sonny, which was twice her normal search time. She had, however, finally tracked down his Social Security number. That little tidbit of information opened up countless doors: credit ratings, Department of Motor Vehicle lists, tax info, etc.

His DMV history showed he currently owned an ‘07 Humvee, a ‘99 Grand Cherokee and an antique ‘79 Corvette. A cross-reference to his credit rating showed all three vehicles were paid off.

She again cross-referenced his credit rating to find mortgage information. One residence: a seven-hundred thousand dollar home in Reno.

Looks like a bum, lives like a king.

With a few keystrokes, she back-hacked from his credit report into his bank account. Interestingly enough, he showed only thirteen grand to his name. She'd have expected more from a man with such expensive tastes.

How about tax evasion?

She calling up his IRS records. Her eyes widened slightly as she pieced together his tax history over the last thirty years. IRS files showed his income from 1970 through 2002 at over seven million dollars. She ran a tax-fraud sniffer program created by the NSA, and it came up blank. The man was honest, at least when it came to taxes.

His exemptions and records painted a rather detailed picture of his life. For one thing, Sonny McGuiness appeared to be quite the philanthropist. Over the years he'd given $100,000 to both the United Negro College Fund and the Wildlife Fund, $200,000 dollars to the Paralyzed Veterans of America and over $300,000 to Brigham Young University's archeology department.

Kayla's anger grew. She checked her watch—5:12 a.m. She was running out of time. She had booked a 6:45 a.m. flight to Salt Lake City, and she didn't want to head out there completely empty-handed.

While Sonny's financial picture was notable, it didn't give Connell anything to work with. Connell needed blackmail information, not a report on Saint Sonny. She abandoned the financial strategy, instead setting the tax-sniffer program to hunt up information on Herbert Darker. Leaving that routine to run in the background, she moved on to see if Sonny had a criminal record. A quick scan of all national and state police databases turned up quite a list.

Bingo. Hopefully this would be what Connell needed. Her heart leapt when she saw a felony conviction, but it sank again as she noted the year. The old prospector had served a two-year stint in Ryker's for assault and battery, but that was in ‘75 and ‘76, almost thirty years ago.

She continued to fume as she read through the other seven entries on his rap sheet — all arrests for solicitation of prostitutes. For a man who listed his legal residence in Reno, Nevada, she didn't think a patronage of the world's oldest profession would provide adequate blackmail material.

Slow rage rose in her chest, a warm feeling that spread through her body. Sonny was clean, no information worth Connell's time.

The computer beeped, indicating it had finished searching Herbert Darker's file. She immediately called it up and read through the long list of tax information. Her anger subsided as her smile widened.

"Honey, hurry up or I'm going to be late,” Herbert said. He stood at the bottom of the stairs, looking into the kitchen. His wife Angie busily stuffed matching Tupperware containers into a cloth lunch bag. Herbert's company had grossed almost a million dollars that fiscal year, but he still couldn't bring himself to buy lunch. After ten years of struggling to build his own business, the frugal habits established in the early days were impossible to break.

A high-pitched scream of attack ripped through the house; Herbert braced himself as his son launched off the third-to-last stair and landed on Herbert's back. Herbert let out a small whuff and stumbled forward. Luke was getting bigger and stronger every day; pretty soon the daily Attack from the Stairs would send Herbert sprawling across the entryway's Spanish tile floor.

"Take it easy, Luke,” Herbert said with a small laugh. “You're going to kill your dad one of these days."

Luke squeezed Herbert's shoulders tightly. “I wouldn't kill you, Daddy, I love you."

Herbert smiled and lowered his oldest son to the ground. Angie hurried over with the cloth lunch sack in her left hand and his youngest son, Mark, clutched awkwardly in her right arm. Mark was also getting big-soon he'd probably be joining his brother in the kamikaze stair attacks.

"Thanks honey,” Herbert said, giving her a kiss, then planting a kiss on Mark's forehead.

The phone rang just as Herbert walked out the door. He stopped automatically as Angie answered it. She held it toward him. He checked his watch, sighed, then grabbed the phone while Luke laughed and climbed the stairs for another attack.

"Hello?"

"Hiya, Herbert,” crooned a woman's sultry voice. “On your way to work?"

"Yes, I am, and I'm going to be late. Can I help you?"

"I sure hope so,” the woman said. “I need to meet with you. Immediately."

"Who is this?

"I've got some tax information you might be interested in."

Herbert froze. “Excuse me?"

"I know about your taxes, Herbie. I know everything. I assume you want to talk to me in private, but I can be at your house in five minutes, if you like. I'm sure your wife would love to hear what I've got to say."

Herbert felt a combined wash of rage and terror. “Did Kirkland send you?"

"Does it really matter?"

Herbert's heart raced with fear of discovery. Angie looked at him quizzically. “No, no that's quite all right,” he said into the phone. “Where did you have in mind?"

"Pioneer Park. You know where it is?"

"Yes, I know."

"Ten minutes. I'm Ms. Smith. Look for the gray van."

The phone clicked as the woman disconnected. Herbert slowly set the phone down, fear dripping into his soul.

The shrill ringing of the phone brought Sonny out of his semiconscious state. While his body remained exhausted from a night of amorous adventure with the exquisitely talented Chloe, his mind popped instantly alert, ready for the day.

"Yes?"

"Mr. McGuiness?"

"Who is this?” Sonny said, instantly suspicious. He'd told only one person — Herbert Darker — where he was staying.

"Mr. McGuiness, my name is Connell Kirkland. I represent a company that would like to talk to you about your find."

Connell “Cutthroat” Kirkland of EarthCore. Anybody who knew anything about the mining world knew that name. Kirkland's rep preceded him; he was a man not to be trifled with.

"I'm flying into town and I hoped we could meet for dinner,” Connell said.

Sonny felt anger well up inside him like a rocket warming up for launch. The only find he'd had in over two months was the Wah Wah site, and he'd only discovered that two days earlier. Only Herbert Darker knew about that find. Had Herbert sold him out? Sonny's first urge was to hang up, but he needed to know the extent of the possible betrayal. He also needed to know what information this Kirkland character held. Besides, EarthCore had deep pockets. Whatever Kirkland offered, it would probably prove a good starting-off point for open negotiations with other companies.

"Augustino's,” Sonny said. “Make the reservations for eight p.m. Ask for Sonny McGuiness's table. Don't be late.” He started to get up, preparing to go out to Darker's and find out what the hell was up. As he rose, a hand with long fingernails lightly scraped his back. He turned to see Chloe smiling up at him, her caramel skin beautiful against the white sheets, her lush lips slightly parted, her black eyes glinting with sex.

Sonny's anger dissipated, replaced by morning lust. He had all day, after all — Herbert wasn't going anywhere.

Kayla sat and waited. She'd parked the gray, nondescript rental van under a struggling elm tree just outside a typical suburban park. She checked her makeup in the van's rearview mirror. She still looked damn good, if she did say so herself, even though the only sleep she'd had was a brief catnap on the flight out from D.C. The bags under her eyes showed through the makeup, but only slightly.

Sonny McGuiness might have nothing to hide, but Herbert Darker had a closet full of financial skeletons. He'd pulled in $210,000 from Connell, one rat-out at a time. If the IRS found out about that unreported sum, Herbert would be looking at a decade in prison at least. If she was going to come up with something on McGuiness, she'd have to fabricate it. Darker was the only person who could help on such short notice.

Herbert pulled up to the curb in his Cadillac. As he got out, Kayla evaluated him; five-foot-five, maybe one hundred and fifty pounds, all the muscle of a Dachau victim. No visible weapons, poor coordination. An easy mark.

She opened the van's sliding side door and stepped out. The three-inch heels on her black pumps slid into the grass, but only a little. She saw Herbert's eyes widen. She couldn't blame him, as she'd dressed to elicit just such a reaction. Her loose cotton skirt barely hung below her ass, showing off strong legs. The pumps only added to her five-foot, ten-inch frame. Her long, straight blond hair draped loosely around her face and shoulders, framing emerald eyes and a sultry smile. A halter top showed plenty of deeply bronzed skin as well as toned arms, shoulders, and a smooth six-pack of abs. She flashed Herbert a practiced smile and waved him forward. She saw his guard instantly drop. He was still angry, but like a typical man, most of his fear subsided when he laid eyes on a sexy woman. He was a man, after all. And men weren't afraid of beautiful women.

He eyed her with a suspicious glare. “I have a message for Kirkland. You tell that asshole he crossed the line when you called my home."

Kayla flashed a look across the park. The only kids present were at least fifty yards away, occupied with the sandbox, paying no attention to the van or the adults beside it. Kayla still smiled at Herbert, then reached back into the van. She pulled out a Taser. Herbert's eyes widened slightly, but before he had time to run or call out in surprise, ten thousand volts coursed through his body. Kayla watched Herbert's body shudder and jerk from the electricity.

She cut the power and he fell forward. With practiced ease, she caught him on the way down and flipped his short, light body over her shoulder. She effortlessly tossed him into the van. Jumping in after him and slamming the door, she quickly rolled him on his stomach, then tied his hands and feet behind his back with thin copper wire. Herbert moaned softly, incoherently, as Kayla buckled a ball-gag's leather straps around the back of his head.

She slid into the driver's seat and gunned the engine, smoothly pulling out of the park and down the street. The kids never looked up from their summer play. Someone in the neighborhood might have seen, but Kayla wouldn't keep ol’ Herb long. She zipped through the songs on her iPod — Cindi Lauper would do nicely for the drive. Kayla tapped the steering wheel in time to “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun."

Herbert regained consciousness and started mumbling. The words seemed incomprehensible through the ball-gag, but Kayla had done this before — she had heard such words more times than she could remember.

"You want to know where I'm taking you, sunshine?” Kayla asked, flashing a seductive smile over her shoulder. “Somewhere we can be alone. Gotta ask you a few questions."

Fear flashed on Herbert's face. Fear and incredulousness. Just like a man — take away control of any situation, and they crumble like little boys.

While she didn't know Salt Lake City, she'd scouted the area before setting up the meeting with Herbie. A vacant factory sat less than two minute's drive from the park. She pulled into the empty, weed-choked parking lot and drove behind the building, out of sight from the main road. It wasn't a great hiding place, but she only planned on a fifteen-minute encounter.

She killed the engine. It was time to get to work. Cindy Lauper wouldn't do, she need some theme music, something a little more… rocking. The thumbed the iPod's click-wheel until the display read “The Donnas — Take Me to the Backseat."

Kayla grabbed her purse and slid around to Herbert. He lay on his stomach, his hands and feet bound behind him. A little blood trickled from his left wrist where the wire had cut into the skin.

"You and I are going to have a little conversation,” Kayla said, kneeling down in front of Herbert and tenderly stroking his hair. “I need to get some information from you. If you're good, I'll let you go. If you're not, I'll kill you."

Herbert's eyes went wide with fear. He tried to say something, but the red ball of the gag blocked all words. Kayla slid around behind him and straddled his back, resting her crotch on Herbert's small ass.

From her purse she pulled a pair of rust-speckled pliers. She could, of course, afford to buy new pliers, but these had sentimental value. Back when the NSA still looked upon her as a fair-haired child, she'd put the pliers to good use in Honduras, Kuwait, Paris, Afghanistan, and even in D.C. They were supposedly one of the reasons behind her dismissal. The truth, however, was that the “men” in the NSA's positions of power viewed her as a threat. André Vogel, the NSA director, had sacrificed her for political gain, made her a scapegoat in order to advance his career. “Made an example” of her, he'd said. Vogel simply found a way to get rid of her because her continued success and unfailing patriotism undermined his control — if it hadn't been for “excessive force,” he would have created some other fabrication. She'd loved the NSA, made it her life. And now she put the pliers to use in the private sector, for neither God nor Country, but only for money. It was so unfair, so empty.

But a girl still had to pay the bills.

She knew the pliers, knew every nook and cranny, every rust spot, every scratch. The engraved words kmart drop forged (japan) showed on the handle. The tip was good for things like ripping lips off of faces and pulling tongues from throats.

The pliers’ best feature, in her expert opinion, were the four pointed “teeth” just behind the tip. They were designed to let you get at nuts and bolts, give you a good grip on such things. They also happened to fit nicely around fingers.

Around knuckles, to be precise.

She slid the cool pliers around Herbert's knuckle, where the pinkie met the hand. Without a word, she squeezed with practiced strength. A loud crunching sound ripped through the van, like a tree branch breaking under the weight of wet snow. Herbert threw his head back and screamed.

His thrashing sent a tingling jolt through her body. Her skin felt electric, so sensitive she could feel her skirt sliding across her thighs.

Herbert pulled at his restraints, but the wire only dug further into his skin. He stopped fighting and stayed still, but kept screaming. His body trembled with fear — Kayla's breathing came in short, shallow pants. She could feel the blood coursing through her body.

Kayla stroked his hair. He sounded loud, but she knew from experience that such screams were practically inaudible outside the van. He started crying, still trying to mumble through the ball-gag. She recognized these words as well.

"Why?” Kayla said, echoing his question as she slid the pliers up to the second pinkie knuckle. “I'll tell you soon enough, sweet thing."

With a snarling smile and a sigh of passion she crunched the knuckle. Herbert thrashed his head and his screams filled the van. Kayla's eyes sparkled with delight.

She used the pliers to cut the wires and free his wrists, then rolled him over like a limp rag doll. He tried for her throat, but one grab and shake of his broken, swollen pinkie ended all thoughts of resistance. As his face screwed into a mask of agony, she calmly re-wrapped the wire, binding his hands over his stomach.

Tears and snot streaked his face. Bleary eyes looked up at her with mindless incomprehension. In less than ten minutes, he'd gone from a meeting in a sunny park to a helpless torture victim.

She straddled him again, then reached down and unsnapped the ball-gag. It popped from his mouth and hung off his left cheekbone, a thick strand of spit running from the rubber to his lower lip.

"Please stop!” he said. “Please!"

Kayla stroked his hair once again, wiping the tears from his eyes. “I need some dirt on Sonny McGuiness."

Confusion filled Herbert's face.

"I need to blackmail him. I know you've got something I can use."

"Use? Blackmail?” Herbert stammered. “I don't… I don't know anything like that."

"You'd better come up with something,” Kayla said sweetly. “Or I'll do another knuckle."

Sobs racked his voice, each word following a sharp, snot-filled intake of breath. “You… crazy… fucking… bitch!"

Kayla held up the pliers so he could see them clearly. His eyes shot open and his crying ceased immediately.

"Wait a second, just give me a second, okay? I've got something, I swear."

Kayla waited, letting Herbert think. She watched him blink furiously, as if his eyelids were mental speedometers.

"Okay,” he said in a rush. “There was this mine a few years ago. The Jorgensson mine. Sonny discovered it and sold it but it went bust. You could say he knew it would run dry but he sold it anyway…"

Herbert babbled for several minutes, the sound of a broken man begging for his life. The subservient tone of his voice caressed Kayla, adding to the electricity coursing through her body. She pulled a notebook from her purse and scribbled down the information, smiling the whole time. This was exactly what she needed.

He also babbled about Sonny's new site, anything to keep her from reaching for the pliers. The words billion-dollar find rang loudly in Kayla's ears.

She placed the notebook back in her purse. When she finished with Herb, she'd hit the computers and get all the necessary details. Connell would have his information, and by his ridiculous deadline.

Damn you're good, girl.

Kayla stroked his hair one more time, then slid into the driver's seat and started up the van. She checked her watch: She'd snagged him, bagged him, broken him, and got the needed info in less than fifteen minutes. Not her personal best, but pretty damn close.

The gray van pulled away from the empty factory.

Kayla pulled up behind Herbert's Cadillac, then cut the copper wire around Herbert's wrists and feet. She handed him a clean white towel to clean up his wounds. Aside from the broken pinkie, he had only minor cuts on his wrist. All in all, it was a pretty clean job, one that wouldn't draw an ounce of suspicion when Herbert went to the doctor and gave some excuse for the pinkie.

Kayla smiled — true to her word, she hadn't put anybody in a wheelchair.

She opened the van and helped him out. His shoulders slumped and his head hung low, a man broken in spirit and body. He reminded her of an old balloon, saggy and half-deflated.

This, Kayla thought, was the true essence of any man.

"Now, I'm going to let you go,” she said. “And you're going to keep your trap shut. If you don't, I'll give my info to the IRS, and then I'll come for your sons."

Herbert's head snapped up, pain suddenly forgotten, the spark of defiance back in his eyes. Perhaps there was a backbone in there after all.

"Let's just say little Markie and little Lukie will never play the violin again.” She slowly opened and closed the pliers. The metal squeaked like a baby bird calling for food. “You understand?"

He nodded quickly, pain still in his eyes, but suppressed for the moment.

She always threatened the kids. They were better than the wife or the husband, because you never knew who would prefer their spouse tortured and dead. Threaten the children and people listen. In ten years using that theory, she'd only had to keep her promise once. Just once. And that one time had ended her NSA career.

Kayla felt a rush of that familiar anger at the man who'd drummed her out of the NSA. Not a day went by when she didn't think of it. She shook her head and tried to push the thought away. Water under the bridge. You can't go home again. She tried to think of some other folksy sayings to console herself.

Besides, she was very good at her job. Herbert had provided excellent information. Perhaps she needed to find out more, see if there was a way to profit from such a find.

She clicked the iPod and the stereo blared Lacuna Coil's “Heaven's A Lie” as she pulled away. She'd never before pried into Connell's matters for her own gains, but this time was different. This looked like the big meal ticket. “A billion-dollar find,” Herbert had said. The mining industry paid top dollar for information like that — companies with platinum mines in particular. Somehow this whole situation was going to pan out for Kayla Meyers. Pan out in a big way.

Sonny was seething inside, but it didn't stop him from enjoying his second Alaskan king crab. He cracked open a thick claw and dipped the white meat in succulent butter sauce. He didn't know what Augustino's put in the sauce, but it was his favorite among the hundreds of four-star restaurants that knew him on a first-name basis. Despite his anger, Sonny wasn't about to let the situation spoil his dinner. Especially when someone else was picking up the tab.

The generous young man paying for the expensive meal sat across the table. The tall youngster with curly black hair looked calm, relaxed, patient. He wore a suit, but it was frumpy and even outright wrinkled in places. It reminded Sonny of something Peter Falk wore in that old Columbo show. Connell Kirkland obviously wasn't a typical mining corporation executive, not at all what Sonny was used to. The executive's appearance, however, was of little concern at the moment.

The most pressing question was how fast this man had made contact — less than twenty-four hours after Sonny picked up the sample testing results. After sending Chloe home with a generous tip, Sonny went looking for Herbert but wasn't surprised that the backstabber hadn't been in all day.

Herbert's betrayal infuriated Sonny. That kind of thing just wasn't done; it was the very reason Sonny always hid his finds and always had his samples tested at the same place. Apparently that strategy had paid off. If Sonny had given Herbert the find's location, Kirkland and his company would already be greasing the local politicians and buying up the property rights.

"Interestin’ that you know of that find, Mr. Kirkland,” Sonny said between mouthfuls of crab. “I hadn't told many people — how'd you discover it?"

Connell stared hard for a moment, expression never changing, then answered. “Let's cut the bullshit, Mr. McGuiness. I'm not going to play games with you and I hope you're not going to play them with me. You know damn well where I got the information. How you handle that aspect of the situation is up to you, I really don't care. The important thing is that I know of your find, I want it, and I want it before anyone else finds out about it."

Kirkland's abruptness surprised Sonny. Company men were usually smiles and compliments and bullshit. This guy was all business. Connell struck Sonny as the kind of man who'd sell his own mother to a Bangkok whorehouse if she could turn a regular profit.

"That would be expensive,” Sonny said after washing his crab down with a big swig of milk. He never drank during business. He knew better than to lose his wits around people like Connell Kirkland.

"How expensive, Mr. McGuiness?"

Sonny took another big bite, using the napkin he'd tucked into his shirt collar to dab at some butter running through his beard. He chewed thoughtfully, staring right back at Connell. A small smile played mischievously at the wrinkles around Sonny's eyes.

"Fifteen million.” He took another bite of crab. He'd expected the number to shock the executive, at least a little. Connell's gaze never fluttered.

"Perhaps if you owned the land and the mineral rights, we'd play with that number,” Connell said. “But you own neither. And we both know that if you tried to buy them, we'd outbid you instantly and you'd be left with dick. Let's not bother talking about claim-jumping and other legalities. EarthCore's lawyers have twenty years experience beating cases just like this one. We'll pay one million dollars."

Sonny kept chewing, but felt his anger rising. He didn't notice a tiny bit of crab meat that perched on his beard, jiggling with each syllable. “You listen to me, you little fuck. You wanna play tough? I'll go to a dozen other companies with what I've found and start a biddin’ war that will make you bend over, grab your ankles and beg me to fuck your ass if I give you the original price. Fifteen million is what I'm askin’ and someone will pay it. You want the site? Fine, then you're gonna play by my rules. I been handlin’ people like you since before you was a tingle in your daddy's little pecker."

"Oh?” Connell said. A smile of his own peeked out. “Somehow I doubt that you've ever dealt with someone like me."

"Forget it, Kirkland. I'm contacting Impala Platinum and the Stillwater company first thing tomorrow morning. I know damn well what I've got, and I'm putting it up on the open market. The only person who will know the location is the one who pays the most money, so your lawyer friends won't have any chance to jump the claim. If you want to play ball, fine, but you're going to have to bid on it just like everybody else."

Connell nodded, then pulled some papers from a briefcase and slid them across the table.

"Take a look at that, Mr. McGuiness,” Connell said, the smile gone from his lips. “You'll see that your friend Mr. Darker was very helpful to us. Remember the gold find you sold to the Jorgensson Mining Cooperative in 1994? You know, the one that netted you six hundred and fifty thousand dollars? The one that went bust when the initial high-grade ore gave out after only a month of mining?"

"I don't guarantee my finds!” Sonny's forkful of crab bounced like a pointed finger, shaking at Connell with each word. “Everybody knows they're paying for a location, that's it! I've been doing business that way for twenty-five years."

"Yes, of course, Mr. McGuiness,” Connell said calmly. “But in front of you is a statement from Mr. Darker saying that you knew the vein was small and that the ore grade was too low to be profitable beyond the first hundred-thousand tons. According to Mr. Darker, you knew damn well that the mine was a lemon, yet you sold it anyway."

Sonny's eyes widened with fury and his jaw dropped, the tiny piece of crap still clinging precariously to his beard. He'd done an honest trade for decades. Never screwed anybody. People knew the risks when he sold a location. No site was a sure thing. That was part of the game.

"I didn't know any such thing, you stupid fuck!” Sonny stood up abruptly, his chair scooting backward and falling on the floor. Other diners cast disapproving glances his way. “The ore I found near the surface was very rich. They agreed with my findings and that's why they bought the location!"

"That's not what Mr. Darker will say in court, after I pass this information on to the Jorgensson people, Mr. McGuiness."

Connell maintained a blank expression, while Sonny's wrinkled face betrayed murderous rage. Sonny knew, now more than ever, that this find was the big one, the proverbial mother lode. Blackmail was a risk, a big risk, and people didn't play this kind of cock-out hardball unless the payoff was worth such a risk. More than likely it was the biggest find of Sonny's long career — and now this gawky, blank-faced sonofabitch wanted to steal it.

If Sonny had been twenty years younger he'd have tossed the table aside and smashed Connell's nose like it were a ripe tomato. But those days were gone — at sixty-two he still worked the mountains better than men a third his age, but brawling wasn't a skill that had followed him into his golden years.

"Mr. McGuiness, please calm down,” Connell said, his expression now full of understanding. “I'm not going to use this on you unless you force my hand. We both know it's bullshit, but that doesn't matter. Jorgensson lost millions on that deal, and if they think out you knew the mine was a lemon, they'll come after you with both barrels blazing. They'll want to make an example of you. With your prison record, you know you'll end up in jail. Now save us some time with the ‘I'm innocent’ and ‘that charge will never stick’ crap because we both know you're fucked."

Sonny bubbled over with anger, but nodded in agreement. He'd been outplayed before he even knew the game was on. Connell had come loaded for bear. He knew of the Jorgensson mine and he knew of Sonny's prison term. The concept of prison brought the situation home; he'd rather be screwed than risk another stint in jail, away from open skies and sprawling landscapes. Like Mama always said, a smart man knows when he's licked.

"What I want to do is negotiate a fair price,” Connell said. “Fifteen million dollars is ridiculous. I'll admit, so is one million, so why don't we meet somewhere in the middle? I just happen to have the upper hand this time. You're still going to make a great deal of money and you'll still have your vacation in Rio, so let's just relax and talk business."

Sonny sat down and resigned himself to getting the best deal he could.

"I'll give you one million dollars up front, cash,” Connell said. “And I'll give you two percent of the net profit for the life of the mine."

Sonny's jaw dropped. He'd never before had a permanent piece of the action. If this mine was all it seemed to be, two percent could eventually make $15 million look like monopoly money. Connell held all the cards and they both knew it — he didn't have to offer a piece of the pie. With that bit of graciousness, most of Sonny's anger quickly faded away.

"Listen, Kirkland,” Sonny said leaning forward across the table. “If you think that I'm gonna sit and wait for the checks to come in, you're crazy."

"What are you saying, Mr. McGuiness?"

"I want to be there. I don't trust you a lick, which I'm sure don't surprise you none. If you want the location, then I'm there every step of the way and I see every financial that crosses your desk. I want full access to the books for this entire project, so I know what the real net profit is."

"That's not going to happen."

"Then I guess I'm going to jail,” Sonny said, and leaned back in his chair.

Connell simply stared, that same impenetrable, blank expression covering his face, hiding his thoughts. Sonny'd seen a lot of cold men in his day, but he couldn't remember anyone as unreadable as Kirkland. Sonny had no doubt, however, that Kirkland could read him like a book. Sonny was beat, but he wasn't going to lie down. He was still the only one who knew the location, and with that knowledge he had power. Jail or no jail, he wasn't going to let Connell win every hand in this game.

"I can't say I blame you,” Connell said plainly.

"I'm there. I need to be involved."

"It's against company policy, Mr. McGuiness, but in your case I guess we have to make an exception.” Connell said. “Come to think of it, I understand you're somewhat of an expert on the area."

"Know it better than you know the folds on your cock, mister."

"Could you research the site for us? We need to know everything that's gone on in that area, know if anyone has dug there no matter how far back. Any information we get on the area makes our job easier. And more profitable."

"I can tell you everything that happened there since the last ice age,” Sonny said, a sneer on his face. “All I need is a little time."

"That you've got, Mr. McGuiness,” Connell said with a winning smile. “That you've got."

To seal the deal they spent the rest of the evening getting incredibly drunk and incredibly obnoxious. When they were finally thrown out at 1:00 a.m. Sonny looked forward to participating in the mine's success — the fact he'd been blackmailed all but forgiven.

Drunk off his ass, however, he forgot one important fact. With the deal, he'd placed himself in a situation he'd sought to avoid. He had to return to that mountain, the dead mountain where animals had the good sense not to tread.

Chapter Six

Connell turned sideways in his sleep, his long legs hanging off the side of the Motel 6 bed. A smile graced his lips. A smile for his wife. If anyone who knew him could have seen him at that moment, they'd probably have been shocked to see that expression on Connell Kirkland's face.

The smile suddenly vanished, replaced by face-scrunched fear. He kicked at the sheets, thrashing about in the bed, his head shaking back and forth in a violent “no-no-no."

He awoke screaming, hands flailing and knocking the bedside lamp across the room. The cheap porcelain body shattered against the pumping air conditioner. He sat up, stomach heaving as he gasped for breath, and wearily rested his head in his hands.

The glowing red numbers of the alarm clock read 3:02 a.m. — 6:02 a.m. Detroit time. Since he was already awake, he might as well get cracking. He didn't want to bother with a shower, but the stink of fear clung to his sweaty body. He rinsed quickly, toweled off, and tossed on his suit, which had been carelessly flung on the floor, tie still knotted loosely around the empty shirt collar. By the time he left the hotel he had pushed the dream from his mind.

Sonny's first duty as consultant was to apply his expertise and research the site's history. He rose at 8 a.m. with a wake-up call from the front desk and sonofabitch of a hangover. He hoped Kirkland felt worse. Ten minutes later a full breakfast came courtesy of room service. Sonny hadn't ordered the food, but he ate it anyway. He checked out a half-hour later only to find his hotel bill paid courtesy of EarthCore. Keys to a brand-new rental Cadillac DeVille waited for him at the desk. Like the hotel bill, the car was paid in full. Along with the keys came a package and a short note from Connell Kirkland: Get cracking — we have to act fast. I'll call you tomorrow at 5 p.m. for your first report.

Sonny opened the package: a cell phone. Sonny pocketed the phone and walked to the Caddy, whistling all the way, only to find a dangerous-looking Asian man (Sonny couldn't be sure whether he was Japanese or Korean, maybe…) leaning on the hood. Glossy black hair fell just short of his smiling black eyes. Sonny immediately took in the man's perfectly tailored pants and his Gucci shoes — a sharp dresser with expensive tastes.

"Good morning, Mr. McGuiness.” The man flashed a smile that could charm a snake out of its skin. “I'm Cho Takachi. Mr. Kirkland sent me."

"And what are you supposed to do, drive the car?"

"If you like,” Cho said. “I'm here to assist you in any way I can."

"Kirkland is a sonofabitch and I don't need any assistance.” Sonny walked around to the driver side. Cho let himself in the passenger door — with his own key.

"If you don't need my assistance, then I get paid to stand around and do nothing,” Cho said, his joviality undaunted. “Easy money. That's fine with me. I'm also here to make sure you don't back out on your deal with EarthCore."

Sonny started the car. He'd never thought Connell would hire a baby-sitter. Sonny sighed and resigned himself to the situation. Wasn't much he could do about it anyway, and judging from that chrome-plated, pearl-handled .45 peeking out from under Cho's jacket, Sonny didn't want to push the situation.

"Fine,” Sonny said. “Just one thing; stay the hell out of my way. I don't trust fuckhead company goons like you."

"No problem,” Cho said with a charming grin. “I don't trust dirty, wrinkled-up, little-old-asshole prospectors, so I empathize with your situation."

Sonny blinked a few times in surprise, then put the car in gear and smiled a little himself.

He liked this Cho Takachi already.

The drive to Provo went amiably enough. Sonny discovered that Cho had served in the Marines for four years. After hearing a few details of Cho's service tour in Iraq, Sonny decided he'd much rather have Cho for a friend than an enemy.

Hungry for discovery, they went straight to the Brigham Young University library. Cho proved to be a highly educated and eager assistant right from the start.

Prospecting for information was nothing new to Sonny. He'd researched hundreds of old mines and depleted areas in his day. It was valuable to know who found what and how they found it, as well as how long it lasted and what extraction methods were last used. A vein that “ran dry” in 1914 could be reworked with leaching or strip-mine techniques made possible by modern technology. If you found one of these veins, bought up the worthless property and then sold it to a mining company, you stood to make a tidy profit. Time and time again Sonny had scooped the young prospectors. Their fancy equipment often overlooked the obvious — it's much easier to find an old mine than to discover a new vein.

In researching his mountain, he started with the computer indexes, everything from books to periodicals. He didn't find diddly. There was probably more written about the boys-gymnasium shitter than that area of Utah. It was almost as if the peak didn't exist to the general public. It didn't even have a name. Tourists didn't visit. There was no water; nothing but rocks, sand, and devilish terrain. Only experienced campers ventured into the hills.

When the infernal machines known as computers proved useless, Sonny led Cho to the library's real mother lode of information — bound volumes of long-dead ghost-town newspapers. Many towns popped up during the booming days of Nevada's Comstock Lode in the 1860s. Those towns depended on the surrounding mines. When the mines dried up, so did the towns.

In any American small town, one can usually find leather-bound tomes containing old issues that often date as far back as a century or more. For ghost towns, it wasn't so easy. Many of the dead papers’ back issues were bound, but you had to track them down. The irreplaceable historical volumes could wind up just about anywhere (Sonny had once found vital issues of the Sand Spring Recorder, a paper from a dead town in central Utah, in a private library in Laramie, Wyoming).

History faded away, and no one — not even those born and raised in the area — knew anything about the majority of the mines that had once dotted the desolate landscape. Much of the information sat lonely and waiting in those ghost-town newspapers. A newspaper was a big part of mining town life in those days. If a new mine returned anything, readers wanted to know. They also wanted to know what areas were hot; “rushes” to a new site were as common as the sunrise.

Sonny's first guess for any mining news concerning the Wah Wah site was the Silver Reef Gazette. Silver Reef was a famous ghost town about eighty miles south of where he'd discovered the platinum dust. Eighty miles through the rocky desert flats constituted at least a two-day ride, and that was if a single rider really pushed a healthy horse. Any kind of wagon could count on a three- or four-day ride. The Gazette carried local stock exchange information and news regarding the hundreds of mining corporations that sprang up in Southwest Utah, Northwest Arizona, and even into Nevada.

After six hours of squinting at yellowed and faded old newsprint, Sonny finally found something useful from May 10, 1865.

The story surprised Sonny. Eighty-seven miles north of Silver Reef would have put Jessup within a mile of where Sonny discovered the spring. In fact, less than a mile. Platinum was almost unheard of in those days. It often occurred alongside gold deposits, but many miners threw away the platinum because they didn't know what it was and only wanted the gold. Before 1900 or so, most recovery processes lost up to 99 percent of the ore's value, and often lost all the platinum group metals.

The more he thought about it, however, the more it made sense. If the spring Sonny discovered was bigger back in 1865, there would have been a good-sized stream to pan. Jessup may have found that very same spring — or one similar to it — and staked a claim.

Sonny found the next entry regarding the mine on August 24, 1865. Jessup had apparently returned to Silver Reef with a bag of dust, only to find his treasure-trove wasn't as it seemed.

Sonny's mouth went dry.

"A ten-pound bag?” Cho said. “How much would that be worth today?"

"About a hundred and thirty thousand big ones."

Cho let out a long whistle. Sonny flipped through the pages. Like a soap-opera junkie left hanging at the end of a Friday episode, Sonny couldn't wait to read of Jessup's fortune. He wanted to get back to the spring and do some panning himself. Maybe pull out a few more pounds of dust, especially before Connell got his paws on the site.

Sonny's excitement chilled when he read the next entry, dated November 30, 1865. The story of the Jessup mine suddenly changed from minor coverage to front-page news with thick, black, screaming headlines.

This reporter has rendered pictures of the strange curved knife below. The knife is a solid piece of metal. Its maker is unknown.

The sketch showed the curious murder weapon. There were two crescents, joined back-to-back and off-set a little, so that the knife made a loose, pointy “S” shape. An open circle sat in the middle of that S, where the two crescents merged into one piece of metal. Sonny had never seen anything like it.

"Looks like homeboy went a little off his rocker,” Cho said, reading the article over Sonny's shoulder. The story shocked Sonny, and not because of the murders. Tales of murder in the golden age of mining were so common that many killings barely merited a paragraph in the local paper. In some towns things grew so out of control that there was at least one murder a week. Men often killed in the hills, either to protect a mine or because they just went crazy. Months in the desert, feverishly digging through the rocks, running out of food and water, fending off attacks by Indians and, more often, by claim jumpers — all of these things often drove men over the edge.

The thing that bothered Sonny was the feeling he'd had while on that cursed mountain, when he'd found the spring. Something felt wrong there, something felt… evil. He wondered if Jessup had felt the same thing, so many years ago.

Sonny rubbed his eyes. He had to pass this information on to Connell, and he had to get out soon and find the actual location of the Jessup mine.

Connell opened up a browser window and typed in “earthcore.biz/intranet.” He typed in his logon and password, then started calling up information on one of EarthCore's key employees. Now that Connell had the location of Sonny's “Silver Spring,” the real work could begin. The entire area surrounding Sonny's discovery needed to be examined with a fine-toothed scientific comb in order to find the platinum dust's source. Connell trusted only one man to properly execute the vital task.

While EarthCore had no less than five certified geniuses on the payroll, Angus Kool sat atop the heap. Connell had hired Kool sight unseen three years ago, right after the scientist procured his third Ph.D. at the age of twenty. Within a year, Kool was named EarthCore's top scientist and placed in charge of the company's research division.

Connell hadn't set foot in any of EarthCore's labs in over four years, since before Cori died. It wasn't as if his presence was needed. Under Angus's control, the department clicked like a finely tuned machine — though perhaps a well-disciplined Nazi SS squad was a more fitting analogy. Kool ran the lab with dictatorial hand and demanded perfection from his underlings, some of whom were more than twice his age.

McGuiness's find required immediate analysis, which meant Kool needed to be in the lab ASAP. Connell called up EarthCore's master personnel schedule, only to find Kool on vacation — yet again — this time caving in Montana. The man didn't just study geology, he lived it, traveling to all corners of the world spelunking. Wild blood pumped through Kool's veins. He was an adrenaline junkie who arrogantly demanded over three months of vacation each year for daredevil stunts like mountain climbing, skydiving, base-jumping and jungle canoe excursions — but mostly for spelunking. Connell wasn't surprised to hear Kool was out, but he needed the man in Detroit. Now.

The itinerary showed that Kool was on vacation with Randy Wright, another of EarthCore's big-brained scientists. Randy was Angus's little adrenaline-addicted sidekick. Wright had been at EarthCore a good ten years. Maybe he could share some wisdom with Angus. Connell didn't really care what it took, as long as they were both back to the office tomorrow morning.

When Angus Kool and Randy Wright emerged from the Dunston Caves in Montana, mud covered them from head to toe in a thick brown slime. That mud dried on the drive back to the hotel, and by the time Angus walked into the lobby, chunks were flaking off him with every step. He could have wiped himself off like Randy had, but he enjoyed seeing the look of disgust on the hotel manager's fat face.

Plebeian, Angus thought. If all his mind can focus on is a little dirt on his carpet, then he deserves some aggravation.

Angus walked to the front desk and banged his hard hat on the counter, sending chunks of dried mud scattering across the countertop. The manager's face swelled with barely repressed anger as Angus wiped the filth from the side of his white plastic helmet, revealing a plethora of Peanuts stickers, mostly Snoopy and Schroeder.

"Any messages?” Angus asked with an innocent smile. The manager's name tag read Moe, something Angus found ever so fitting.

"Yes sir,” Moe said through a failed attempt at a smile. “A Mr. Connell Kirkland called for you, said to call this number immediately.” The manager held out a scrap of paper, which Angus ignored.

"Hold all outside calls,” Angus said with an arrogant wave of his hand as he walked away, leaving a trail of mud crumbs in his wake.

As Angus walked to the elevator, Moe stared hatefully at his back.

Randy brushed the countertop mud into a neat pile, then swept it into his upturned helmet.

"Sorry,” Randy said, an apologetic smile on his face. Black-framed glassed highlighted laugh-lined eyes. He was so skinny the coveralls hung on him like the clothes of a prisoner of war. Sweat matted his thinning black hair.

Moe looked down at the now semi-clean counter, then up at Randy's face. Randy was a short man, and still a good two inches taller than that red-haired pain in the ass that went by the name of “Dr. Angus Kool."

"Thanks,” Moe said dryly.

Randy shrugged and walked to the elevator, holding the helmet upside down so as not to spill any more dirt on the lobby carpet.

Moe watched Randy enter the elevator. As soon as the doors closed, Moe unfurled the scrap of paper and dialed

Yeah, I'll hold all your calls, you pompous little piece of shit. He waited for the call to ring through.

"Hello? Yes, connect me to Connell Kirkland please. He'll want to speak with me immediately. Tell him it concerns Angus Kool."

Angus entered his room and immediately stripped out of his coveralls, leaving him clothed in only sweaty underwear and a grimy T-shirt decorated with a big picture of a dancing Snoopy. The coveralls sat on the floor, a crusty pile of fabric and dirt.

A shower would be the thing. A long, hot shower, clean all this dirt off and then find someplace with a big greasy burger and greasier fries. He and Randy could plan out the next three days. They'd discovered a new branch of the Dunston Caves. The branch was tiny, barely enough room to crawl through, but it was new. Never before seen by man. They'd slithered through three hundred yards of thin mud to find it, then explored a good fifty feet of the coffin-sized passage before turning back. There was no hurry; after all, they had another three days to explore. And if that wasn't enough, Angus would just call in and demand more vacation time.

The phone rang, breaking his thoughts. He answered it automatically.

"What's up?” he said, expecting to hear Randy.

"Angus Kool?” The voice was not Randy's. Angus remembered the message waiting for him at the front desk. He felt his anger rise at the manager, who'd obviously done this on purpose. Angus hated uppity common people; they just weren't smart enough to see the big picture. Kind of like monkeys with vocal abilities.

Angus sighed. “This is he. If this is work, it had better be good."

"It's work, Mr. Kool, and it's damn good. This is Connell Kirkland."

"Hello, Mr. Kirkland.” Angus hated to use the word mister with anyone, but if there was one piece of corporate mythos he believed, it was that Kirkland was one bad mamma-jamma, someone you didn't cross unless you were ready for a serious altercation. Of course, Kirkland was used to dealing with businessmen, and that was a far cry from crossing swords with someone of Angus Kool's mental abilities.

"I just got in and was getting ready to call you,” Angus said. “What can I do for you?"

"I need you in Detroit immediately, Mr. Kool. We have a development that demands your attention."

"Immediately? But I'm on vacation."

"We have a matter of major importance to the company that needs your attention. You are booked on the 8:45 p.m. flight to Detroit out of Butte. You will be on it."

"Like hell I will. Who do you think you are? What's the company going to do, fire me? I don't think so. Whatever it is can wait. I'm busy."

"You decide that for yourself, Mr. Kool,” Connell said. “If you're not on that plane and back to work tomorrow at eight a.m., you will be in a great deal of trouble."

"Oh puh-leeze. Come on, Mr. Kirkland. No one is going to fire me and you know it. If you canned me, my considerable talents would be working for the competition inside of twenty-four hours. As a matter of fact, that sounds pretty good right now. I think I'll sharpen up my resume and see what the big world has to offer. What do you think of that, Mr. Big Stuff?"

There was a brief pause. Angus waited for Kirkland's inevitable backpedaling. Suits, after all, should keep to their own petty little affairs and not bother the intellectual elite.

"If you think you can do better than EarthCore, be my guest,” Connell said in a flat, cold voice. “But if I were you, I wouldn't underestimate the power of one's reputation."

"My reputation is flawless."

"Is it, Angus? Funny, I have a very different perspective on things. And — I'd imagine — so might anyone else who contacts me regarding your abilities. Or, for that matter, anyone else I should choose to contact on my own."

Angus sat down on the bed, his eyes narrow, his nostrils flaring. Could Kirkland really trash his rep? Could he? Kirkland was a legend in the mining community, known as a ruthless, no-holds-barred bastard when it came to acquiring sites. He was also known as a plain dealer once he had what he wanted. The most important thing, of course, was simply that he was known. He was a man with influence in the field, a man who might be able to sully even the stainless reputation of a purebred genius. No, he couldn't have that much sway in the field. People would know anything Kirkland had to say was sour grapes, they would know with but the briefest examination of the facts that Angus Kool was the greatest mind of a generation.

"Maybe I'll have to take my chances,” Angus said.

"Maybe you will, but I don't think that's in your best interest. Please don't be late tomorrow.” The connection broke and the phone filled with the dial-tone drone.

The fact that Angus didn't slam the phone down was a feat of self-control. He ran his hands through his dirty shock of coarse coppery hair. He'd been talked to, as a father might give his son a good talking to. On top of that, he'd been hung up on. The audacity was simply too much to grasp.

Who the fuck was this Kirkland, anyway? Some stupid executive who thought that an MBA was a measure of intelligence? Angus hated executives. He'd stack his three Ph.D.s up against a mountain of MBAs any day.

He'd fly home all right. He'd storm right into Barbara Yakely's office and raise holy hell. If she didn't know how her pet thug Connell Kirkland ran the business, he'd fill her in. Connell might be her favorite, but she'd surely never let anyone talk to Angus Kool that way. Never.

Chapter Seven

Angus Kool slammed open the lab door, his face a narrow-eyed visage of rage. He seemed to leave an almost-visible contrail of emotion. He'd been talked to for the second time in two days. Only this time it wasn't Mr. Big Stuff Connell Kirkland who did the talking to, it was Barbara Yakely. And her lecture made Connell's seem timid by comparison.

He'd stormed into the RenCen offices expecting Yakely to bend over backwards, and instead found out she'd be more than happy to help out with Kirkland's dirty tricks. Angus no longer had any doubt who was in charge of EarthCore. Yakely and Kirkland, in that order. Angus ranked third. A distant third.

Angus had never been second at anything in his life, let alone third. It had been all he could do to walk out of her office without screaming, to leave the building without smashing something, to get in his car and drive to the lab without suffering a burst of road rage.

He'd show them both. Sooner or later, he'd show them.

The staff watched him stomp through the lab, leaving haughty indignance in his wake. He headed straight for his office, not volunteering a word to anyone. This lab, his lab, was a place where he ruled, where he called the shots. To be summoned here, ordered around like an undergrad — it was insufferable. Angus ripped open the door to his office, intending to slam it loudly behind him.

But there, sitting on Angus's desk, was grim-faced Patrick O'Doyle. Angus froze for a moment, surprised to see the burly man in his office. O'Doyle was EarthCore's security chief and all-around badass. Rumor had it he was an ex-Green Beret. Rumor also had it he'd been a secret government sniper, and that he'd once whacked a head of state in some third-world country.

O'Doyle's piercing eyes seemed to hold little value for human life. He was big, a little shorter than Connell's six-foot-four frame but much heavier, weighing perhaps 250 pounds. His burgeoning beer belly stood as the only blemish on an otherwise thick and muscular frame. Each time O'Doyle moved, Angus saw both the twitchings of muscle and the jigglings of gut.

He looked old enough to be Angus's father. A thinning white crew cut covered a pinkish scalp. A mass of scar tissue clung to where O'Doyle's right ear should have been. He had a freshly scrubbed appearance complete with an immaculate, wrinkle-free blue uniform. He gave Angus the impression of a two-legged, thick-necked, one-eared bulldog.

"Good morning, Dr. Kool,” O'Doyle said politely.

"What the hell are you doing in my office?” Angus suspected his angry tone wasn't quite as convincing as he would have liked it to be.

O'Doyle didn't answer. Instead, he handed Angus a printout of an e-mail.

"Mr. Kirkland phoned me this morning and asked me to make sure you were here on time,” O'Doyle said. His voice was deep and thick, yet respectful. “He'll be pleased to know that you're early. I've been permanently assigned to your department. No one is to enter or leave without my knowledge, on orders from Mrs. Yakely. I know this will be an inconvenience, but no one is allowed to take any material out of this lab until further notice. Should you work late, we've converted the east storage room into a bunkhouse for the convenience of you and your staff. I'll stay out of your way as best I can."

Kool's curiosity dominated his immediate anger at this intrusion on his authority. He'd never seen anything like this in his three years at EarthCore. What the hell was happening that could light such a fire under Connell's ass? What could produce this level of urgency, or paranoia?

As if to answer the thought, O'Doyle reached into his pocket, pulled out a jangling key chain, and unlocked a steel briefcase sitting at his feet. He removed a red folder.

"This is the report I was instructed to give you. You are to read it and then give it back to me. No one on your staff is to know about the contents. You are instructed, by Mr. Kirkland, not to discuss details of this information with your staff, although he understands you will have to have them work on various aspects of it."

"What's this all about?” Angus asked as he took the folder, his curiosity so strong the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end.

"I don't know, sir. I'm not authorized to look at it."

Angus opened the folder, his mind spinning at the militaristic, secretive overtones that had suddenly engulfed his job. Itcontained a metallurgical analysis report. One glance at the report, and everything suddenly became clear. Now he understood O'Doyle's presence, as well as Kirkland's urgency and threats. EarthCore was sitting on what could be the richest mine in history.

The report's numbers shocked Angus. The sample was almost pure platinum mixed with iridium. Naturally occurring precious metals contained impurities; even dust contained impurities — but not this sample.

With the revolutionary techniques he'd recently developed, he could make a map of the very ground itself and hopefully pinpoint the exact source of the dust. If that source proved to have any size whatsoever, the profit margin could prove staggering.

"I'll need to contact Harrison Geo-surveying immediately,” Angus said. “We need their helicopters."

"No outsiders,” O'Doyle said. “Mr. Kirkland was quite specific about that."

Angus stamped his foot. “But I have to survey the area immediately!"

"Tell me what you need,” O'Doyle said calmly.

"I need helicopters, at least two, and they need to be retrofitted with new equipment I've developed. And they need to be the big cargo type."

"Just give me a printout of what you need, and I'll make it happen."

"I don't think you understand,” Angus said. “We're talking a half-million each. Kirkland going to authorize that?"

O'Doyle smiled patiently. “Of course, sir. If you'd just give me the printout, I'll take care of it."

Angus let out a low whistle. If Kirkland was spending that kind of money without batting an eyelash, he was betting the proverbial farm on this project.

"I'll provide EarthCore employees as pilots and crew, sir,” O'Doyle said. “But you need to assign technical people to run the tests. Mr. Kirkland asks that you assign your best people, your most trusted people, to handle any fieldwork."

Angus nodded, then turned quickly toward the lab. A strong hand on his shoulder stopped him before he reached the door. Startled, he turned.

O'Doyle offered a polite smile. “You have to leave the file with me, sir."

Angus blinked a few times, not understanding, then looked down at the red folder in his hand. “Oh… sorry.” He practically threw the folder at O'Doyle.

Eyes snapped up as he strode into the lab. He felt better, he felt like himself again. Here was a project that would demand every ounce of his genius.

"Randy, saddle up! You're heading to Utah."

Sonny McGuiness and Cho Takachi continued to dig for background on the Wah Wah site. They'd spent forty of the last forty-eight hours buried among BYU's musty archives, digging their way through countless yellowing newspapers, rare texts and research journals that were old before the computer was even invented. Cho kept popping No-Doz, and Sonny ribbed him for violating Mormon rules against caffeine.

"It's disrespectful,” Sonny said. “We're at Brigham Young, for crying out loud."

Cho looked exhausted. “What do you want from me, old man? Connell didn't tell me I'd be up for two days straight."

Sonny laughed. “So much for your ‘easy money,’ eh, kid?"

"Don't worry, it's not like I haven't pulled all-nighters before. I was a medic in the Marine's, first class. I went to med school after that."

"You're a doctor?"

"Was a doctor. For about a year."

"What the hell are you doing for EarthCore, then?"

Cho shrugged. “I didn't like working in hospitals. Too much politics, too much BS with insurance companies and all that."

Sonny nodded. “Uh-huh. You got sued, did you?"

Cho looked angry for a second, then broke into a tired smile. “You're pretty damn sharp for an old wrinkled fossil. Yeah, I got sued."

"And this must be so much more exciting than a boring old emergency ward,” Sonny said.

Cho shrugged and yawned. “Actually, this is pretty cool stuff. Now can we get back to work before I pass out?"

Sonny hadn't found much more on the Wah Wah Mountains, let alone the area of the platinum find. People didn't write about it for much the same reason poets didn't wax romantic about a pile of cat crap — the Wah Wahs were ugly and held little interest. Sonny did, however, find a few geological surveys of the area, mostly obscure research papers written by graduate students. One of these proved immensely interesting.

"Tunnel Systems in the Lower Wah Wah Mountain Range,” was the name of a paper written by one Samuel J. Anderson in 1942. Sonny came across a reference to Anderson while browsing through thick, leather-bound tomes of old Brigham Young student newspapers, the story describing the grad student's discovery of cave formations in the Wah Wah range. Sonny investigated central filing and found the report — paper worn thin and spotted with mold — buried in a rust-specked filing cabinet. It obviously hadn't been read in decades. Many of the old research papers were still filed away, remnants from the days when Brigham Young was a small school and didn't have twenty thousand students.

Sonny only gave the report a cursory glance until he read the tunnel's location, which — if accurate — put the cave less than a mile northeast of the Silver Spring. That location also rested just over a half-mile east of the Jessup mine coordinates. Anderson's cave was smack-dab in the middle of a pair of platinum finds.

The report detailed Anderson's discovery of a long passage located about five thousand feet up the side of the mountain. He and his fellow students followed one of the tunnels for around four hundred feet before hitting an old cave-in that blocked further access. Anderson surmised that primitive people had once lived in the caves; he based that theory on a tool discovered deep in the tunnels.

Sonny's blood chilled as he read more on the tool. Anderson thought it worthy of little more than a footnote compared to the geological formations, but it did strike him odd enough to list a brief description.

Anderson's paper included a crude sketch of the blade. The nasty-looking, double-crescent shape looked exactly like the murder weapon Jessup had used almost eighty years earlier.

In the report, Anderson had written the number 32 next to the knife. A footnote reference. Sonny looked at the footnote and found another number. He excitedly jotted down the number in his notes.

"What are you writing?” Cho asked.

"This looks like an archive reference,” Sonny said. “I'll bet Anderson turned the knife over to the anthropology department. In most museums they've got more stuff than they can deal with. Tons of material is archived. You should see these sonofabitchin’ vaults — even the oldest museum workers don't know what half the stuff is anymore."

"So this knife is still around?"

"Could be. We'll check it out as soon as we're finished here."

Cho threw Sonny a quizzical look. “What's an archived knife got to do with mining?"

Sonny scratched absently at his beard. It was a good question. What did the knife of some long-gone Indian tribe have to do with the platinum find? Probably nothing. But that didn't stop Sonny's curiosity. If the knife existed, the same kind of knife Jessup used to slaughter his men, Sonny simply had to see it.

"You never know,” Sonny said after a long pause. “That's twice this weird knife has come up. I wanna make sure we don't miss a damn thing."

"You certainly are a persistent old fart, Sonny,” Cho said with a tired sigh.

"Watch and learn, boy. You don't get to be as rich as me using good looks and a long pecker — and you ain't got either."

Cho laughed as Sonny continued to pour over Anderson's paper. The report concluded by detailing plans for another excursion, scheduled for March 1942. Anderson had found a possible blockage in the tunnels. He felt if he could clear it out, the shaft might extend farther into the mountain.

They found no other papers from Anderson. Sonny went back to the bound volumes of The Y News, the college paper, starting with March 1942. The paper was small back then; most issues were little more than six pages long. It was easy to quickly browse a year's worth of newspapers. After only three minutes he found another article on Anderson, dated April 4, 1942.

They read the account of the students’ disappearance. Sonny felt a cold breeze blow over his soul.

"Keep flipping,” Cho said. “Maybe they found them later on."

Accounts of the missing students were in every issue of The Y News, but the articles grew smaller and smaller. The last article Sonny could find appeared in an issue dated May 30, 1942. It simply said that the students were presumed dead.

"Starting to look like it's not a very nice place,” Cho said, his joviality subdued for the moment. “Maybe we should just call it Funeral Mountain."

Sonny's mind whirred as he picked up his cup and spat some Copenhagen tobacco juice into it, a thin trail clinging from his white beard to the cup's edge as he set it down. There were only two well documented explorations of that area, and both times those parties turned up dead or missing. Or insane. Sonny was beginning to think that there was a reason this platinum find had gone unnoticed for well over a century. He was also beginning to doubt his involvement with EarthCore's project.

But he couldn't back out, not yet, not with two percent of the mine's future on the line. Sure, he had a million bucks, but that two percent could amount to an ungodly amount in both the near and far future. That two percent income was the legacy he could leave his children and grandchildren, enough money to set them all up for their entire lives.

His contract stated that if he left the project before the mine was running and turning a profit, he would forfeit his percentage. If he wanted that two percent, he had to see this thing through.

That could take months. Months of being on that mountain, with that clammy feeling of darkness creeping up his groin and tickling his balls. He should fly to Rio right now, and have his balls tickled by something much more hospitable than that desolate, dead mountain.

It wasn't just the money. He needed to know why people kept going missing — or dead — on Funeral Mountain. His curiosity had always overpowered his good sense. Sometimes that curiosity led him to fortune, like when he followed up even the thinnest lead and struck pay dirt, or it led him to dead ends, like when he spent weeks proving there was no substance to a certain lead. What happened with the leads themselves was usually incidental. Sonny had to know the whole story, no matter how trivial it might be.

There was more to learn, more dark secrets buried in mildewy piles of paper and stacks of forgotten ledgers. Things that didn't want to be found, that wanted to die and fade away into the past.

The CH-47 C Chinook helicopter buzzed through the night sky over the Wah Wah mountains, back and forth, back and forth, each pass another tenth of a mile south. Small antennae arrays fixed to the bottom of the helicopter fired powerful radar signals into the ground and recorded their reflections.

Randy Wright sat in the Chinook's cargo bay. He watched data feed into his laptop, data showing the area's underground composition. The night before they'd completed the north-south lines of the grid, and in another two hours or so they'd finish the east-west lines. It was quite an accomplishment, a twenty-five mile grid knocked out in two night's worth of flying.

He had a crew on the ground collecting soil and plant samples from all over the area. Another crew was preparing a series of explosives. Advanced instruments would detect reflections of the explosive shock waves. Once they finished the radar grid, collected the data, and boxed all of the samples, the crew would detonate the explosives and gather the readings.

Once that was done, they'd load up the data and he'd head back to Detroit. It was a two-day data-collection sprint, the scientific equivalent of a commando raid. With the technology at his disposal, however, two days was all it would take to provide Angus with everything he needed.

Chapter Eight

So what are you telling me, Sonny?” Connell said into his cell phone as he took the Wayne Road exit off of I-94. “That we need to scrap the whole project because there's some bad history in the area?"

"I don't think you could classify multiple murders and missing persons as simply ‘bad history,’ Connell,” Sonny said. “I think that mountain is cursed."

"Cursed? Oh come on, Sonny, don't tell me you're superstitious."

"You're goddamned right I am. Hell, Connell, I'm the friggin’ definition of superstitious."

"So are you telling me your professional evaluation is we need to stay off that mountain? Is that what you're telling me, that we walk away from the discovery because you've got a bad vibe?"

Sonny paused a moment. “Well, I don't know if I'd go that far."

"Good, because that's not the shit I need to hear right now,” Connell said. “You've given your report, you've found prior evidence of people panning the area for dust, so that helps validate our computer models. You've done a good job. Now if you want to stay off the mountain and forfeit your two percent, I have no problem with that. Is that what you want?"

"Of course not!"

"Good. Then I don't want to hear anymore of this crap, and I'll expect to see you on-site."

Sonny sighed. “Okay, Connell."

"See you in a couple of days.” Connell hung up as he pulled into EarthCore's main research campus.

Four years. Had it been that long since he'd come to the EarthCore lab? That long since he'd stopped by just to see how everyone was doing? There had been a time when he didn't let a week go by without stopping by the company's main lab near Romulus, a Detroit suburb, touching base, talking to the technicians, getting the scoop on the latest research techniques, the latest family news, the latest office gossip. Of course, there was also a time when he gave a shit. He got far more done staying in his office at the Renaissance Center, working the phone and the computer, than he ever had when he took an interest in people's lives.

The nondescript building in a nondescript industrial park in a nondescript part of town had no signage, which was status quo for any EarthCore facility. From the outside, it was just another faceless building in the midst of a dense industrial sprawl.

No one had left the lab in three days. At first Angus ordered everyone to stay, but that order rapidly became unnecessary as the staff pieced the situation together. And when Randy returned from Utah with a laptop full of data, the excitement level soared beyond measure. People slept only in snatches, and Angus's demands pushed everyone's talents beyond natural limits.

Angus mentioned briefly to Patrick O'Doyle that some of the scientists had families. O'Doyle made a quick call and then assured the staff that everyone's family was taken care of. EarthCore staffers baby-sat, cooked, cleaned, and helped shuffle kids to and from school. It didn't stop parents and spouses from feeling guilty, but it did comfort them enough to stay in the lab and keep working around the clock.

When Connell Kirkland arrived that morning, the lab looked as if it were staffed by zombies on crack. Bleary-eyed people scurried everywhere, hair dirty and sticking out in all directions, lab coats wrinkled, eyes adorned with dark bags. The only one who still looked normal was Angus Kool.

It surprised Connell to see how much the labs had changed. New equipment lined the walls of the original lab, which had expanded from the original building to two additional buildings in the industrial park.

As Connell entered the room, work slowly ground to a halt. Technicians stared at him in obvious shock. He recognized most of them. Others, he realized with some surprise, he'd seen only as pictures in personnel files.

An Arabic man approached him, smiling widely. Connell remember the face, but couldn't place the name.

"Connell, it is so good to see you again,” the man said. He seemed to want to extend his hand, but was unsure if that was the right thing to do. “It has been a very long time since I have seen you."

Achmed. His name was Achmed. Connell hadn't seen this man since… since… since the night Cori had died. Achmed had been at that fateful New Year's Eve party. In fact, before the party, he and Cori had gone out to dinner with Achmed and his wife. The four of them had been friends, and Connell hadn't spoken to the man once since that night. Connell remembered calls from Achmed, consolation cards, supporting emails — all of which he'd ignored.

"Achmed,” Connell said. “It has been a long time. How is…” His voice trailed off. He couldn't remember her first name; he couldn't remember their last name, either.

"Rana is fine,” Achmed said with an understanding smile. “We hope you are doing well."

"I'm fine,” Connell said, perhaps a little too quickly.

Achmed nodded. That same understanding smile on his lips couldn't hide the sadness in his eyes. “I'd better get back to work. Angus is very demanding.” Achmed turned and walked back to his station.

O'Doyle spotted Connell, smoothed out his uniform, and quickly walked over. Connell was grateful for the distraction. He hadn't known O'Doyle… before.

"How's everyone doing, O'Doyle?"

"Fine, Mr. Kirkland. People seem to be getting enough sleep, but Mr. Kool is a slave driver. He reminds me of my old drill sergeant."

"Dr. Kool is pushing them hard?"

"Nonstop,” O'Doyle said. “Nothing they do satisfies him. He's tireless; he hasn't slept once in three days. Normally I'd be concerned by that, but look at him."

Angus stood on the other side of the large lab, oblivious to Connell. He moved like he was made of caffeine; fatigue found no purchase on his body.

"You call these results?” Angus said, practically screaming at a small, black-haired woman, a sheaf of computer printouts clutched in his hands. Connell vaguely remembered her name — Katerina something-or-other. He remembered hiring her shortly before Cori's death. Lab workers flinched every time Angus's arrogant, nasal voice exploded at the woman.

"I said, do you call these results, Katerina?"

The woman looked up fiercely, eyes on the point of tears. “I've double-checked the metallurgical analysis,” she said, her tone full of defensive frustration. “It's consistent both times."

Angus threw the report. The pages spread out like a flock of birds, then fluttered to the ground. “Well do it again! That work isn't fit for an undergrad, for God's sake! Do it again! And make it quick — this repetitive work is making you fall behind."

"I'll bet he wins Mr. Congeniality,” Connell said quietly.

"He picks on her the most,” O'Doyle said. “I peeked at her files. She's got a 156 IQ. I wonder how Dr. Kool would treat a dumb old soldier like me if I worked under him?"

"You're not dumb, O'Doyle. And besides, you'd probably strangle him."

"No sir!” O'Doyle said. “I would never strangle him… I'd use a knife."

Connell laughed, and he was a little surprised to hear the sound escape his lips. He laughed so rarely that it sounded strange to him. O'Doyle was a damn good employee, a man who in two brief years had single-handedly turned EarthCore's security force from a joke into a unit that might be mistaken for a platoon of crack commandos. Connell felt confident knowing that O'Doyle would be one of the first at the Wah Wah site.

Connell walked toward Angus. O'Doyle trailed a step behind. Angus saw Connell coming. Surprise, then haughty anger, spread across his face. He straightened his lab coat. Charlie Brown, Snoopy, and Pigpen pins decorated his lapel.

"Well, if it isn't the king himself,” Angus said. “Coming down to watch your lowly serfs toil?"

Connell stared at Angus, and wondered how anyone could work with this man and not punch him in the face.

"Dr. Kool, I hope you've got something for me other than a surly attitude."

Angus nodded, his wild red hair bobbing in time with the motion. “Randy Wright collected fascinating data from the Wah Wah site. We discovered one rather large anomaly of extremely dense material three miles underground. What is odd, however, is that we found none of the usual indicators of a large platinum deposit. With dust on the surface, such as Mr. McGuiness found, I expected to see some biogeochemical evidence of a deposit. The roots of some trees and plants gather elements from the ground and transmit them to the leaves. Juniper bushes, for example, which are common at the Wah Wah site, can send roots as far as a hundred and sixty feet below the surface."

"So you're saying you found nothing there?” Connell asked.

"Nothing,” Angus said. “No biogeochemical evidence of anything but iron, let alone platinum or any other valuable mineral. And that corresponds with our other surveys that show no metallogenic evidence of a deposit."

"Metallogenic?"

"Various minerals in a given area can reveal probable locations of undiscovered deposits,” Angus said. “We've found absolutely no elements commonly associated with a platinum deposit. In addition, we've seen no surface discolorations in fly-overs. There are no surface traces of any kind, either for platinum itself or for metallogenic indicators."

"So you're saying that aside from the dust Mr. McGuiness found, there's no indication of a platinum deposit?"

"Not using traditional techniques,” Angus said. “But we have some more information, mostly due to advanced tomographic techniques I've developed."

"Do you mean topographic?” O'Doyle asked.

Angus glared at the man with a look of contempt. “No, Mr. O'Doyle, I mean tom-o-graphic. Topography is mapping the surface. Tomography is mapping the ground itself, the shape and the contours of various substances and densities."

Connell longed to wipe that sneer from Angus's face. “Angus here is an expert on tomography. You're standing in the presence of greatness, Mr. O'Doyle."

"Gee, it's my lucky day,” O'Doyle said flatly.

Angus ignored the remark. “Ground-penetrating radar, known simply as GPR, can map the contours of solid ground by sending radar waves into the earth and charting the time of their echo, much like you might use standard radar to locate a plane in the sky. Current GPR techniques only allow a maximum of a thousand-foot penetration below the surface. My new method, however, allows you to penetrate up to sixteen thousand feet — over three miles. That's eight times better than anyone else in the world, I'd like to note."

"Stick to the matter at hand, Dr. Kool,” Connell said.

Angus turned to a computer terminal and called up a graphic of tightly packed vertical lines of varying height.

"This peak here is our anomalous dense area,” Angus said, pointing to the longest line on the graphic. “Notice how much higher it is than everything else? That's because it's dense. Really dense, much more so than the surrounding rock, which indicates that if it's metal ore it's very high-grade."

"What do you mean ‘if’ it's ore?” Connell asked.

"Part of the problem is that we had a lot of noise in the signal, like very weak, very soft areas throughout the mountain. To bolster our data, we took geophone readings. We detonated high explosives throughout the area and took readings based on echoes. It's just like taking a CAT scan except we measure the travel time of the seismic waves resulting from the explosions rather than X rays sent through the patient. I combined this with the GPR readings to map the whole area."

Angus tapped the mouse and a three-dimensional picture appeared on the screen. The picture showed a solid green mass at the center, broken up in many places, but clearly oblong in shape. A bright yellow envelope surrounded the green mass. Faded yellow vein-like branches extended in all directions, but mostly up and away from the mass. Only one straight, thick yellow vein pointed down, protruding from the center of the green mass, until it fuzzed and faded to nothing. The picture gave the overall impression of a neon-green sea anemone in search of food, waving hundreds of thin yellow tendrils through the water.

Connell was used to seeing similar pictures, courtesy of Angus's cutting-edge talents, but normally a plethora of colors and shapes representing myriad rocks and minerals dotted the screen. Even the most concentrated deposit images showed at least a dozen significant changes in color. In addition to the map's apparent simplicity, he didn't recognize the sprawling yellow lines.

"This isn't what I'm used to seeing,” Connell said. “Explain it."

"Well, the green is our baby,” Angus said.

"But where are the other minerals?"

"There aren't any. That's what's so strange about all this. That mountain is a big, solid, worthless chunk of limestone. There's some low-grade iron ore, but that's it. I filtered it out of the map so we could really see what's there. All we have in there is limestone and the Dense Mass, which we think is all platinum ore."

"How big is this Dense Mass?"

"About four miles long, a bit over one mile wide.

Connell's eyebrows rose in amazement. “Just in one big chunk?"

"Just in one big chunk,” Angus said. “I know it's weird, but it gets better. The yellow lines — the soft stuff I told you about — we know why it appears to be too soft to be rock. It's not rock, it's not anything. As near as I can tell, those are caves."

Connell stared at the map. The green area, which represented the four-mile-long Dense Mass, looked very small in comparison with the horde of yellow lines snaking across the screen. The map showed a depth of over three miles, and many of the yellow lines hovered near the bottom edge. Some of the yellow lines appeared to be very tiny, while others were thick and solid. Solid yellow blobs dotted the map, including the one that surrounded the long green shape.

"Just how deep is the Dense Mass?"

"The magic number is 16,000 feet,” Angus said. “Just a hair under three miles.

"Is there anything else like this in the surrounding area?"

"Nothing that we've seen,” Angus said.

"Does that strike you as strange?"

"The whole damn thing strikes me as strange. We've got a potential platinum deposit with no standard indicators that one should exist, and we've got what appears to be a world-record cave system."

"World record?” Connell said. “Just how big is it?"

"The caves near and surrounding the Dense Mass are unusually huge. To date, the largest individual cavern ever found, located in Nevada's Carlsbad Caverns, covers 14.67 square miles with a ceiling as high as 250 feet.

"These Dense Mass caverns are much bigger than that. There's one kidney-shaped cavern at the GPR's bottom-edge range that may be as big as twenty-five square miles, with a ceiling as high as a thousand feet or more. On top of that, the Dense Mass cavern itself is roughly another ten square miles. I've never seen anything like it — no one has. We've made one hell of a discovery here. So far, the longest known system is the Flint-Mammoth Caves in Kentucky with over three hundred miles of known tunnels. I estimate the Dense Mass cave system covers six hundred fifty miles of tunnels and about three hundred fifteen total square miles of cavern."

O'Doyle let out a long, low whistle of amazement. Angus merely nodded.

Connell looked away from the map. The large cave complex was interesting, but it wasn't the important thing. “I assume you've ordered a diamond-drill core sample?” A core sample was the only way to tell if the “Dense Mass,” as Angus called it, was the real deal.

"It's on its way there now,” Angus said.

"Excellent.” Connell disliked Angus, but he had to admit the man was damn good at what he did. “Excellent work, Mr. Kool. Now I know why we pay you so goddamned much. Prepare to set up shop on-site. I've already sent a great deal of equipment there, including that experimental ruby-laser drill head of yours."

"You realize that no one has ever drilled a mine shaft that deep before,” Angus said. “It's going to be one hell of an engineering project. The current world's record is just over two miles. That was engineered by Mack Hendricks for Euromine. He's the best there is. You want to go deeper than that, and you're going to need someone at the top of his game."

"I've got just the person in mind,” Connell said. “You've got other things to worry about. Prepare a list of necessary equipment. I want you and whoever you need ready to do your thing in three days."

"Three days?” Angus said. “You want a functioning lab at the drill site in three days?"

"That's what I said, Dr. Kool. I want that core sample analyzed on-site. Can you do it?"

Angus only paused for a moment. “Of course I can do it."

Connell saw a gleam in Angus's eyes, a gleam he didn't like at all. Angus was probably dreaming spelunking dreams, planning on exploring the vast tunnels beneath that Wah Wah mountain. Connell knew he'd have to keep a close watch on Angus, keep a short leash to make sure the little genius didn't skip off to do some exploring. But such thoughts were premature, really, and nothing mattered until core sample results established the find's validity.

Connell turned and walked out of the lab. He still didn't have any real evidence, but his instincts told him that the Dense Mass could be pure platinum ore, a find so huge that the potential dollar figures staggered the imagination.

Angus watched Connell leave. His head spun with plans and preparations. Setting up a functioning lab in the middle of a veritable desert in three days would be horribly expensive and very difficult. He didn't care, he would find a way to get it done. He had to get it done. Having the lab on-site meant that his presence would be required for at least a month.

The second he'd seen the first computer pictures, the second the massive network of yellow lines danced across his screen, he knew he had to find a way to get to that site. Now Kirkland actually wanted him there. To Angus, the yellow lines were a far greater treasure than any platinum lode.

The yellow lines represented the largest cavern complex ever discovered — a spelunker's Mt. Everest. It was a sure thing that no human had ever explored three miles below the surface.

Angus Kool intended to be the first.

"Be careful,” Sonny said. “It's a sharp sonofabitch."

Dr. Hector Rodriguez, Ph.D., lifted the heavy, double-crescent-shaped knife by the hole in its center. There really wasn't any other way to pick it up — the knife was edge all the way around, inside both crescents and on the outside curves as well. He could only fit two chubby fingers inside the ring. Almost as soon as he lifted it, he lost his tentative grip on the polished circle. The knife turned as it fell and grazed his index finger.

"Oh, my,” Hector said, looking at the red rivulet cascading down his wrist. Blood drops splattered the layers of paper that covered his desktop. He grabbed a handful of Kleenex and squeezed it around his wound.

"Shit, Hec,” Sonny said, standing and leaning forward. “You okay?"

"Oh sit down, Sonny,” Hector said. “Just because I'm a professor doesn't mean I'm a wuss. It's just a little cut. I can't believe how sharp that thing is. What idiot would sharpen an artifact?"

"I don't think anyone sharpened it,” Sonny said. “I don't think it's been touched since they put it in storage."

Hector let out a small harrumph of disbelief and looked at the knife sitting on his desktop. A smear of blood clung to the jagged edge.

"So you don't recognize it?” Sonny asked.

"I'm afraid not,” Hector said. “I've never seen anything like it. And you're sure this came from our archives?"

"That's right. Just sittin’ there as pretty as you please."

"Well, it's certainly unique.” Hector's mind scrambled for some kind of intelligent explanation. He hoped his sweat didn't show — he considered Sonny an old friend, but that didn't mean he wanted to look like an idiot in front of the department's biggest patron.

They sat in Hector's tiny, disaster-area-messy office buried in the archaeology department's basement. Sonny's face was very familiar to the staff, who were always eager to provide him any help he requested. This time, however, Sonny came in with another man, a dangerous-looking Asian with dark, piercing eyes and a false smile.

More important than the man, Sonny had brought the strange knife. Hector knew it looked familiar, but he couldn't place the odd shape. He talked without looking up from his slow examination of the artifact.

"How long has it been down in the archives?"

"Since 1942,” Sonny said. “A graduate student apparently found it in an area I'm prospecting."

"How did you come across that information?"

"You people amaze me,” Sonny said with a laugh. “Y'all don't even know what you've got around here. You've got more stuff in that library and that museum than you'll ever know, Hec."

"Tell me about it. Just not enough hours in the day, Sonny. I remember when—” Hector stopped in mid-sentence, the image of the knife finally crystallizing in his mind.

"You got something?"

"Yes, I think so,” Hector said. He turned to the impossibly overstuffed bookshelves and rifled through reams of loose papers. “I recall that shape. A former BYU student found something similar. In the Andes, I think. A Dr. Veronica Reeves from the University of Michigan. I've got the article here somewhere. A blurb in Scientific American, I think.” Hector sifted through his endless morass of papers, practically ignoring Sonny and Cho.

"I'll leave the knife here, Hec,” Sonny said. “I'll call you later to see if you've found anything."

Hector stopped his search long enough to say good-bye, but Sonny and Cho hadn't even cleared the door before he was digging again. He knew it was there somewhere, where had he seen it? He moved stacks of papers from one place to another. It was like trying to clean up spilled water with an already-soaked paper towel.

Twenty minutes after Sonny and Cho left, Hector found the magazine in question. Dr. Reeves’ Andes find wasn't some obscure article, and it wasn't in Scientific American. It was on the cover of National Geographic. Hector opened the magazine to the article and found the picture that had danced at the edge of his memory — the picture of the knife that looked identical to the one now sitting on his desk.

Hector picked up the phone and dialed an office in the biology department. It was answered by a man with a thick Indian accent.

"Dr. Haak speaking."

"Sanji, Hector Rodriguez in archaeology."

"Ah Hector! How can I help you this fine afternoon?"

"Are you still in contact with Veronica?"

"As well as can be. She is still up in the Andes. Not many phones there."

"Well, you better come over here right away. I think you're going to have to reach her immediately."

"I'll be right down."

Hector hung up and stared at the magazine, amazed he hadn't been able to recall it as soon as he'd seen the knife. After all, it wasn't every day that a BYU graduate's work graced the cover of National Geographic. The article showed a chipped, crescent-shaped blade gleaming on a black velvet background. White letters read Cerro Chaltel: forgotten underground metropolis.

Chapter Nine

Connell had been on hold for twenty minutes. It wasn't like he had anything better to do at 4 a.m. It was 11 a.m. on the other end of the phone. Just an hour before noon in the scorching heat of South Africa. Connell really didn't mind — he had to get this man, the one man who could pull the whole thing together, even if he had to get on a jet and fly to Capetown. If it came to that, fine, but Connell had a hunch he could knock the whole thing out without leaving his desk.

The phone crackled as someone picked up the distant receiver.

"Mack Hendricks speaking."

"Mack, Connell Kirkland here."

"The legendary Cutthroat. I've heard a lot about you. To what do I owe this privilege, Mr. Kirkland,” His thick Australian accent made “Mr. Kirkland” sound like “Mistah Kehklan."

"I want you to come work for me, Mack."

"You made me leave my dig for that? I'm kind of busy here, Mr. Kirkland."

"I need you on the next plane to Detroit."

Mack laughed a big, barking laugh. “Listen, I don't know how you do things in the States, but I don't just walk out on my employers. Now if you don't mind—"

Connell interrupted. “We're going three miles down, Mack."

A brief pause. “Did you say three miles?"

"That's right. And I want you because you're the best. But if you aren't in Detroit tomorrow, I go with choice number two. I know Klaus Honneger would love to shatter your record."

"Now hold on there!” Mack said, anger thick in his voice. “Honneger couldn't dig three miles if you gave him a two-mile head-start. I'm willing to listen, mate, but slow down! You haven't even given me a chance to think about this."

"And I'm not going to give you that chance,” Connell said. “I'm in a bit of a hurry here. I'll have an engineer at that mine tomorrow, it's either you or Honneger."

"What the hell are you digging for?"

"I can't tell you that."

"So you want me to quit my job and fly to Detroit without knowing any details, or even knowing if you're just screwing with me?"

"Our jet will pick you up. Just get here. See what we've got, then you can quit. If you don't like it, we'll fly you back. Are you telling me it's not worth burning a few sick days just to find out if I'm for real?"

Another brief pause.

"Three miles, eh?"

"At least."

Mack sighed. “I can't believe I'm doing this, but I'll be there tomorrow, you pushy, arrogant bastard."

Connell smiled. “Our jet is already at Cape Town. Be on it in two hours."

At 5:33 p.m. Kayla Meyers finally hacked through EarthCore's computer-security programs and accessed the company's intranet. The company's security would keep most people out, even the best hackers in the world. But Kayla, former darling of the National Security Agency, was better than the best.

The NSA's mission revolved around protecting U.S. communications or intercepting foreign communications. The United States government had spent countless hours training her in COMSEC, which was military parlance for “communications security.” Part of her job entailed making sure U.S. communications were free from the prying ears of foreign intelligence operations. The other end of the NSA mission was just the opposite, which was SIGINT, or “signals intelligence."

SIGINT involved intercepting messages from foreign governments and exploiting such information as needed for national security purposes. She'd been trained to pick off messages sent by phone, radio, microwave, laser, or — especially — computer. In addition to training her as a killer and an interrogator, the NSA had trained her to be a communications expert, an artist in data espionage, and a hacker extraordinaire.

Compared to the Kremlin's computer security, EarthCore really didn't pose that much opposition. Still, Connell spared no expense in keeping the company secure and hidden. EarthCore didn't even appear in some government databases. If someone in the company didn't give you a company phone number, you couldn't find one anywhere, in any directory or any database. Even the corporate headquarters were an unmarked suite in Detroit's Renaissance Building. Aside from the building managers and the people in the mail room, no one in the building even knew EarthCore existed.

She relaxed in her chair as she sifted through earthcore.biz's most confidential files. She didn't care about any of them — all she wanted was information on Connell's new project. But she found nothing on platinum, nothing on Sonny McGuiness, not even anything on Herbert Darker. It was as if the new project didn't officially exist.

Paranoid bastard, she thought. Doesn't surprise me a bit, Connell. You don't trust anybody, do you?

Connell had needed that information from Herbert Darker, needed it in case he had to put the screws to Sonny McGuiness. A billion-dollar find. If Connell wanted that site so badly, other companies would pay for that information. The South Africans, in particular, seemed to take it almost personally when platinum was discovered in other countries. If the site was as big as Darker said, it could potentially affect the worldwide supply of platinum, and hence the worldwide price. That was the kind of information companies would pay to know.

Acting on a hunch, she switched tactics and slipped into accounting's travel budgets. Any company's accounting files often provided a warehouse of knowledge if you knew what to look for, knowledge that few companies spent much effort protecting. After all, who gives a crap if the competition sneaks a peek at your travel logs or your expense reports?

Kayla called up all purchase orders authorized by Connell in the past two weeks.

Bingo.

Over ten million dollars of state-of-the-art mining equipment told her she was on the right track, but that wasn't the real find. What finally made her smile was the $356,312.35 paid in advance to Southern Air Freight of Phoenix.

She exited EarthCore's system, erasing all evidence of her presence, and quickly hacked into Southern Air Freight's system. Air Freight's computer system had off-the-shelf protection, and Kayla moved past that with ease. She called up the customer account for EarthCore. Southern's force of five freight helicopters was in the process of shuttling EarthCore's mining equipment from locations around the South to a road-less area in Utah. Kayla noted the delivery coordinates: 38 degrees, 15 minutes north latitude; 114 degrees, 37 minutes west longitude.

A spot in the Southern Wah Wah Mountains.