The FBI Thrillers Collection Books 6-10 - Catherine Coulter [572]
“You can howl at the moon if you want to.” Dix laughed. “What you’ve been through, Ruth, it’s enough to make my macho socks shake off my feet.”
“The important thing is that we’re all here and we’ll get to the bottom of this,” Sherlock said. She gathered Ruth in her arms and hugged her tight as Brewster pushed his nose between them. “You are a hard-ass, and don’t forget it. Now, I want you to tell me caving isn’t that hard. Neither Dillon nor I have ever been off the beaten tourist track in a public cave.”
Ruth pulled herself together. “You have to be real careful. I didn’t find many really tough spots to navigate in Winkel’s Cave, even in the unmapped parts, and that’s probably why the soldiers used the cave to stash their gold bars. The thing is, you’re never supposed to cave alone, so I guess I’m an idiot. I was so excited about this, I told myself I didn’t need to have Luther with me.”
“Yeah,” Dix said, nodding, “that about covers it. You were an idiot. I’m a rank amateur and you couldn’t pay me to go into an uncharted part of a cave by myself, even armed with million-watt searchlights.”
“Thank you, Professor Noble,” Ruth said. She turned to Sherlock. “I love it when a man agrees with me. In any case, I’ll guide you—even though I don’t have the map, I pretty much remember the route I took through the cave. It won’t be too bad, I promise. I’ve been in much tougher caves, like having to belly-crawl through cold water or rappelling down sheer walls and not knowing what’s waiting for you at the bottom—praying there will be a bottom—or shimmying through passages that are too small for a twelve-year-old.
“There aren’t even any real claustrophobic spots in Winkel’s Cave that make your skin crawl, at least that I saw. I didn’t see any bats or cave animals, and there are supposed to be Virginia big-eared bats in the caves around here. It will be chilly, fifty-four degrees is the average temperature, but we won’t have to wade through any streams. We won’t be down there long enough to worry about hypothermia. We’ll need plenty of light, that’s the most important thing.”
She paused. “I have to know what I ran into when I was in that cavern. I wish I could remember. Was there something I wasn’t supposed to see? Did someone pull me out of there? But if they wanted to help me, why did they hit me over the head and leave me lying unconscious in the sheriff’s woods? Fact is, I probably would have died if Brewster hadn’t found me. And then those two men tried to break into the house and shot at me. If they wanted me dead, why did they leave me alive in the first place?”
“Stop worrying so much, Ruth, we’ll find out,” Dix told her. “Hey, Madonna, we already found out what your name is.”
It was lovely to laugh a bit, to let the terror of Winkel’s Cave fade for a few moments at least. Ruth asked Savich, “How did you find me?”
Savich laughed. “Trust me, Ruth, lots of people know the sheriff found a woman in his woods. And everyone knows all about that high-speed chase on the interstate in the blizzard last night and how those two yahoos tried to kill the woman who was staying at the sheriff’s house.”
Sherlock added, “They even sent your picture out over the wires for identification.” She patted Ruth’s hand. “And now we’re staying here until we figure everything out.”
“But, Dillon, I’m the lead on the Tiller case.”
Savich said easily, “I’ll give Dane a call. He can handle it. Don’t worry.”
“But he’s getting married in two weeks.”
Sherlock said, “Then he’ll be motivated to get it cleaned up, now won’t he?”
Dix asked, “The Tiller case?”
Sherlock said, “A farmer in Maryland was tilling a new parcel of land he’d just bought and plowed up some human remains. We’re just getting our bearings on what happened.”
Dix said slowly, “I heard on the radio about you guys finding a kidnap victim dead and buried in a Korean War soldier’s grave at Arlington National Cemetery. What’s that all about?”
Sherlock