Allison Brennan - Fatal Secrets

Where on earth was she?

Running water echoed all around her, deafening. She’d lost her gun when she fell-she felt around for it and her hand fell into deep water. She scrambled back up to where she’d landed. She’d lost consciousness at one point. She must have. She remembered falling and then … now.

More cautiously, she felt the surrounding area, crawling away from the water. Her knees and hands sank deep into mud. She sat and wrapped her arms around her legs, rocking herself.

It was so dark.

The familiar panic rose in her chest, her body breaking out into a sweat. But it was cold, so cold, and she shivered uncontrollably.

Her voice echoed eerily in the dark. “Don’t move, Sonia. Sit tight. Someone will find you. Don’t move. Don’t move. Don’t move.

But they would never find her. How long had she been here? How far had she fallen?

She had to find a way out herself. Or she would die here.

Come on Sonia! You’re not a victim anymore .

She crawled again . Slowly. Carefully. The mud sloshing through her fingers. The ground became firmer the higher she went. Okay. This was okay. She wished she had a light …

Idiot! Brian Stone had given them all emergency lights. Shake and break, he’d said. The long stick was still in her pocket. She pulled it out with trembling fingers, holding it as if it were a life jacket. Shake. Break. A faint glow emanated from the stick. She held it up.

A skull glowed inches from her face.

She screamed.

Dean stopped walking. “Did you hear that?” he asked. He, Brian Stone, and Sheffield were back in the original mine, going down a long shaft following metal rails that had been laid more than one hundred fifty years ago.

“I hear water,” Brian said.

“Good sign,” Sheffield replied, spry for his age. He led the way. “The cavern opens up down here. Unless the river has changed flow dramatically over the last hundred years.”

Dean didn’t want to hear it. He couldn’t. He would find Sonia. He wasn’t going to let her die, not like this.

They continued walking down the shaft.

“Help me!”

“Did you hear that?” Brian said. “She’s not far.”

She’s alive .

Sonia cried out again . How were they going to find her in here? She held the light up, but the cavern was so huge she couldn’t see the walls around her.

She heard a grunt and splash. “Help me! Help!” She cried out. “It’s Sonia.”

“Sonia! Thank God.”

“Charlie? Where are you?”

“I see your light.”

He grunted like he was in pain. She held up the light and saw a dark red shirt in the water as Charlie struggled to get up the slope she’d landed on. She slid down the mud and held out her hand.

He took it. Slowly, she pulled him out of the water.

His shirt hadn’t been red when she last saw him.

“Oh, God, Charlie, what happened?”

“They said you fell. I didn’t know if you had been shot or what. I came after you.”

“Why?” She hugged him tightly. “Charlie, you’re bleeding.”

“There are rocks. I-” He coughed. “I hit them.”

She held up her light and pulled up his shirt. His chest was bloodied; she saw a rib protruding.

“Charlie, lie still.” She pulled off her flak jacket, then her T-shirt. She wrapped it as best she could around Charlie. Tears streamed down her face. Charlie was in bad shape.

“We have to get you out.” He closed his eyes and coughed up water, mud, and blood.

“Why did you follow me? You didn’t know. I could have been dead. I don’t want you to die.”

“That’s a first,” he said faintly.

“I hate what you did, Charlie, but I don’t hate you.”

“You should.”

He didn’t say anything for a long minute. Sonia heard something over and above the water. Faintly, “Sonia!”

She called out as loud as she could, “Over here! Help!”

“Sonia! We’re coming.”

She saw a bright light bouncing against the walls of the cavern.

“Help’s coming, Charlie. Hold still.”

He shook uncontrollably, going into shock.

“Charlie, hold on. It’s just a little time.”

“I want to die, Sonia. I need to die.”

“No. No, dammit! You taught me so much. I’m stronger because of you.”

“You’re strong.” He coughed and this time blood poured from his mouth. “Because of you.”

“Sonia!” Dean called.

“Here!” She waved her glow-stick. “Charlie’s hurt!”

“I’m coming!”

Sonia said to Charlie, “Dean’s coming. Help’s here. Hold on.”

“Forgive me, sweetheart.”

“I forgive you. I forgive you, Charlie, dammit!”

“Find. What happened to Ashley. Please.”

“You’ll find her. Dammit, Charlie, fight!”

The bright lights showed the cavern to be monstrous in size, and Sonia sat on a small cutout. She couldn’t believe how much water was in here. She couldn’t believe she’d survived.

“Don’t die, Charlie.”

There was a ramp and railing that went around the top of the cavern. Dean walked across the precarious edge to get to her. She willed him to be safe. She couldn’t lose him. The five minutes it took to reach her seemed like an eternity.

He didn’t say a word, just held her. He was trembling.

Sonia said, “Charlie’s hurt.”

Reluctantly, Dean let her go. He inspected Charlie’s injuries and checked his pulse.

“Honey, he’s gone.”

“No. No.” She let Dean gather her into his lap and hold her while she cried until Brian Stone came down with a rope to bring them all up, the living and the dead.

Four Weeks Later

Sonia had never seen so many people in her parents’ house.

She put on her best smile and walked through the crowd, greeting everyone.

It had been a perfect day up until an hour ago, when Dean left their wedding reception after giving her a quick kiss and telling her he’d be right back.

To Sonia, right back meant five or ten minutes. Not-she glanced at her watch-sixty-seven.

She made her way to the kitchen, which was surprisingly devoid of people. She crossed to the window and looked into the backyard.

Her parents were there with Riley, Max, and their cousins. She had been tickled when Max showed up with a three-day leave for the Fourth of July weekend. “I couldn’t miss my sister’s wedding,” he’d told her when he surprised her at the rehearsal dinner the night before.

The day had been perfect, but it would have been even more so if Wendell could have lived long enough to see her married to a man like Dean Hooper. He would have liked him.

Sonia didn’t know if she’d ever put to rest the trail of blood left by Noel Marchand, but knowing he wasn’t her biological father helped. It was hard to think of him as anything but-she’d lived nine years with him, traveling from village to village in Central and South America. And although she now knew he was using her to lure his prey, she remembered teaching the children English and French and basic math; she’d taken pride in the farms she helped establish. As Dean told her one night when she couldn’t sleep, focus on the positive and the good, and put the bad on a shelf.

“I know you’ll remember it’s there, but if it’s far enough from sight you’ll forget for a time. And when you do remember, I’ll be here. Always.”

Sonia turned and jumped when a man walked in.

“Sorry,” Dean’s brother, Will, said. The Hooper brothers didn’t look alike, but they had the same chocolate-brown eyes and square jaw. “You have a big family.”

Sonia almost corrected him-her family was actually small-but then she realized her friends, her colleagues, Dean’s colleagues, they were like family. She smiled. “I’m lucky.”