Unstoppable (3 page)

He stopped, maintaining a respectful distance from her as he folded his arms over his chest.

Kelsey tried to sound composed. “My uncle is your commanding officer, is that correct?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And your commanding officer asked you—as some sort of favor—to come protect me for the duration of my job here, is that it?”

“That’s correct, ma’am.”

She closed her eyes. “Please don’t call me ‘ma’am’ again, okay? I mean, you’re probably older than I am.”

He didn’t comment, even though she felt certain he knew precisely how old she was. Her uncle had probably given him her bio, for heaven’s sake. That’s how Joe worked. Every mission came with a file, a set of facts to be committed to memory. Kelsey remembered the Abe Lincoln project from fifth grade, the one that—according to Joe—couldn’t be undertaken until she’d memorized the Gettysburg Address.

She shook off the memory. “So your being here, it’s not really a direct order, is that right? I mean, you’re not going to get fired if you don’t—”

“Joe Quinn asked me to come, so I came. It’s that simple.” Something sparked in his eyes, and she sensed that whatever had brought him here wasn’t simple at all.

“This may be simple for you but it’s not for me,” she said. “I’m the field supervisor here. I’m in charge of eighteen graduate students and six undergrads. I have research to conduct, reports to write, grades to submit, and a professional reputation to uphold. How do you think it looks when my uncle sends out some hired hunk of muscle to protect me from the bogeyman?”

He eyed her coolly, not even flinching at her “hired hunk of muscle” comment, which had been intended to piss him off. Kelsey knew the SEAL code. And she knew whatever debt this man owed Joe it had nothing to do with money.

He nodded slightly. “That Ruger you got strapped to your belt, what’s that for?”

Kelsey’s gaze snapped to her holster. She’d become so accustomed to it that she didn’t even notice it anymore.

She looked up and cleared her throat. “This isn’t Disneyland. We get mountain lions and rattlesnakes around here.”

He lifted an eyebrow. “Coyotes, mules, maybe even a few border bandits?”

Her gaze narrowed.

“Don’t get me wrong. It’s a nice weapon.” He paused. “You know how to use it?”

“Of course.”

“And when’d you get the holster?”

She didn’t answer.

“I’m guessing back home in San Marcos, you usually carry it in your purse, right?”

So Joe had told him about her. At least where she lived. What else had Joe told him? Had he mentioned how her boyfriend had dumped her six months ago?

“When’d you get the holster, Kelsey?”

She squared her shoulders. “Five weeks ago.”

He nodded. “After the second break-in. That was
your
camper, right? The first was Dr. Robles.”

She bit her lip.

“And then when that woman was dragged from her car and murdered last week, not ten minutes from here, I bet that made you think twice, right?”

She didn’t say anything.

“Your uncle cares about you. He told me you’re a smart woman.” He stepped closer until he was towering over her. “He also told me to provide protection for you while you finish your work here, and I agreed.” He unfolded his arms and planted his hands on his hips. “I’m not here to get in your way or get in your business. You want to keep this between you and your uncle? Fine by me. Call me a graduate student and hand me a shovel. But I made a promise to Joe and I intend to keep it.”

Kelsey recognized defeat when it was staring her in the face.

And anyway he was right. She hadn’t had a decent night’s sleep in nearly a week, not since the sheriff had visited the dig site to inform them of the nearby murder and ask if they’d seen or heard anything suspicious.

Kelsey hadn’t. But she’d been in a state of anxious hyperawareness ever since. Just hiking out to this cliff was the farthest she’d ventured away from the group in days.

“Okay, you win.” She crossed her arms. “Now what do you want me to do?”

Heat flickered in his eyes at the question. Or maybe she’d imagined it.

“You don’t need to do anything,” he told her. “Just pretend I’m not here.”

Kelsey Quinn’s archaeology project was bigger than Gage had anticipated. It encompassed four separate areas, two out in the open and two more inside the cave. Including the work tents—which were really just tarps supported by metal poles—and the campers where Kelsey and her boss stayed, the site included almost three acres of privately owned land that was being cleared of ancient artifacts to make room for a mining project. The area wasn’t large from a security standpoint, but it had its challenges.

The main issue was the unpaved road that skirted their setup. It provided a direct—if bumpy—route from the town of Madrone almost straight to the dig site. Just a short detour off the road and you were right there. Problem was, the road also provided a direct route between the U.S.–Mexico border and Interstate 10—and a predictable array of security risks associated with one of the most rugged and least governable tracts of land in the entire Southwest.

Kelsey and her college kids, parked out here with all their SUVs and computer equipment, were sitting ducks. Gage found it amazing they hadn’t had more than a few break-ins. Of course, the fact that the students headed into town each night, back to the relative comfort of the lodge they’d taken over for the summer, made the dig site less of a target for thieves. But the setup left Kelsey and the geriatric Dr. Robles alone with a crapload of computers and equipment.

For a woman who worked at one of the world’s top crime labs, Kelsey showed a remarkable lack of street smarts.

Gage hauled his zillionth bucket of dirt and emptied it onto a large wire screen for sifting. Kelsey’s beanpole assistant Aaron gave him another one of his sullen looks.

“Thirty minutes, people.” Kelsey’s voice rang out across the site. “Then we’ll call it a wrap.”

Gage cut a glance at his principal. She was sweaty and sunburned and her skinny legs were dotted with scrapes and old bruises. A lock of that fiery red hair had come loose, and she stuffed it back inside her Padres cap as she meted out instructions to one of her underlings. Gage watched her work. She was bossy and annoying and promised to be a royal pain in his ass for the next seven days.

And yet there was something about her that made his blood hum. He had no idea what it was—she was the polar opposite of his usual type. And yet he felt it, just beneath the surface, the steady thrum of lust coursing through his veins.

Gage needed a woman. Soon. Didn’t it figure that the one woman to stir his interest after months and months of celibacy would be the niece of his CO, a woman completely off-limits for some quick-and-dirty fun?

But “fun” hadn’t been part of Gage’s vocabulary in months. And that wasn’t going to change anytime soon. He’d come here to work, not play, and the last thing he needed was to get tangled up with a woman guaranteed to make his life an even bigger mess than it already was.

Gage trudged back into the cave for another bucketful of dirt.

Kelsey found Aaron working on the ossuary at the back of the cave, where a battery-powered lamp illuminated a jumble of prehistoric bones. Besides being a brilliant scholar, her field assistant was one of the most meticulous diggers she’d ever known, and she watched with admiration as he worked his roped-off patch of earth. He lay flat against a fence slat that spanned the pit. The makeshift brace enabled him to reach down and remove soil without causing unnecessary disturbance to the burial site.

“Only two centimeters to go on that skull,” she said.

Aaron glanced up at her and lifted an eyebrow. She’d made major progress this afternoon.

“Where’d you get the beefcake?” he asked.

She cocked her head to the side. She hadn’t expected such open hostility.

“Mr. Brewer is a law enforcement colleague visiting from California.”
Liar, liar, pants on fire.
“He’s interested in our dig, and I told him he was welcome to lend a hand.”

Aaron got to his feet and wiped his hands on his jeans. He glanced over Kelsey’s shoulder, where at the mouth of the cave Gage had been making himself useful hauling dirt. He’d been at it two hours, and by Kelsey’s estimation he equaled about six of her anemic grad students.

Aaron crouched down and began dropping tools into a canvas bag.

“If it’s not too much trouble,” she said, “I thought you might give him a brief tour before you pack up for the day.”

Aaron snorted. “No trouble at all. Although I’m not sure ‘tour guide’ falls within my job description.”

“Fine, I’ll do it. You can type up the notes for Dr. Robles.”

“I didn’t say I wouldn’t do it. Just don’t expect me to teach him Archaeology 101. He can crack a book like the rest of us.”

Kelsey swallowed a bitchy comment. She didn’t really want to bicker. She’d had enough aggravation convincing Dr. Robles to allow a newcomer on the project at this late date. Maybe he would have been more cooperative if she’d told him the truth about Gage’s purpose here, but Robles was a lifelong pacifist and she didn’t want to risk a negative reaction if he found out Gage was a Navy SEAL. So she’d come up with the law-enforcement-colleague spiel, which vaguely resembled the truth. It was the only way she could think of to explain Gage’s obvious cluelessness about archaeology and the SIG Sauer plastered to his hip.

“Thank you,” Kelsey said. “I’m going to type up my notes. If I don’t see you before you leave—”

“Dr. Quinn!”

Kelsey whirled around to see a pair of students picking their way around the cave’s stalagmites. They stepped into the lamplight and she saw that it was Dylan and Jeannie, a couple who’d hooked up over the course of the summer.

“What is it?” Kelsey asked.

“We found something,” Jeannie gushed. “Something you need to come see. It’s a mandible.”

“Human,” Dylan added. “We found it in the creek bed just south of the mine shaft.”

“What were you doing at the mine shaft?” The old mercury mine was almost a mile south, along the same stretch of roadway where that woman had been shot.

And the sudden flush of Jeannie’s cheeks told her exactly what they’d been doing at the mine shaft.

Kelsey huffed out a breath. “You guys, come on. Did you listen to anything at all I’ve said about safety? That area’s not even part of our dig.”

“It’s not part of anyone’s dig,” Dylan told her. “You’re the expert, but I’d say this bone looks fresh.”

The sun had
dipped below the horizon but the stones lining the creek bed still retained the day’s heat. Kelsey lay flat against them, blinking sweat from her eyes as she positioned her Nikon camera. She heard the police cruiser pull up. She heard the heavy crunch of boots. She took one last shot of the mandible, collected the ruler she’d used for scale, and walked over to greet the sheriff she’d met the other day.

“Word is you found us a jawbone,” Sheriff Sattler said.

“Actually, two of my students found it.” She glanced up at the line of onlookers who had gathered on the edge of the dried creek. Gage wasn’t among them, and Kelsey wondered where he’d disappeared to.

She led Sattler to the bone and he knelt down for a closer look.

“You think it’s one of your Indians?” he asked.

“At a glance, I couldn’t tell you the ethnicity. But it’s definitely modern, not ancient.” She crouched beside him and pointed to the molars. “For one thing, there are the fillings. Also, traces of dried soft tissue, in this case ligaments. The scratches suggest animal activity, probably carrion birds, but it looks like they missed a few spots.”

Sattler stood up now and surveyed the surrounding area. The lawman was tall and bulky, and his thick silver hair contrasted sharply with his leathery brown skin. If not for the badge pinned to his chest, Kelsey would have guessed him for a cattle rancher.

“Just a jawbone, huh? Anything else?”

Kelsey stood, too. “Nothing readily apparent, but of course you’ll have to conduct a thorough search. A cadaver dog would be a huge help. Does the county have a canine unit?”

“Just the drug-sniffing kind.”

“Well, that won’t work for this.” She brushed her hair out of her eyes and glanced around, hoping to see some evidence she’d missed earlier. It was that strange time of day, lightwise. Everything looked flat and gray and a bone would be easy to overlook among all these rocks.

Sattler pulled a toothpick from his breast pocket and popped it in his mouth. He didn’t say anything, so Kelsey continued.

“Given the animal activity, I’d say there’s a good chance the skeleton could be scattered over a wide area.” She paused and waited for a reaction. Nothing.

“Another possibility is that the remains were buried and an animal dug them up. You might find the rest of the skeleton, except for the skull, obviously, in a shallow grave nearby. You could rope off this area and use ground-penetrating radar—”

“Who could?” Sattler asked around the toothpick.

“You. Your deputies. And your medical examiner will want to—”

“Seco County doesn’t have a medical examiner. Not big enough. Our justice of the peace serves as coroner around here.”

“Your JP, then.”

He nodded. “Fella by the name of Sam Niederhauser, ’bout seventy years old. Not much on death investigating.”

Kelsey stared at him, pretty sure she knew where this was going.

“Fact, that shooting we had last week pretty much wore him out.” Sattler plucked the toothpick out and looked her in the eye. “I hear when you’re not digging up old skeletons, you work at that crime lab in San Marcos. The Delphi Center.”

“That’s right. I’m scheduled to go back there in less than a week, in fact.”

“You’re a forensic anthropologist. An expert on bones.” He nodded in the direction of the campsite. “You’re already out here with all your equipment, why don’t you take a crack at it? See what you come up with.”

“I’ve got a field school to run. And I don’t have jurisdiction.”