Jennifer Estep - Web of Lies

I reached into my back jeans pocket and held out a pair of gloves to him. They were gardening gloves, white with brown trowels on them, but they’d keep us from getting rope burn on our hands — or leaving fingerprints in Tobias Dawson’s office.

“Now, are you coming or not?”

Donovan Caine let out a low curse. But the detective took the gloves from me and started pulling them onto his hands.

——

For whatever reason, the miners hadn’t dug out this side of the mountain yet, which meant the ridge was still covered with rocks and gnarled vegetation. It was a steep, slippery slope, made more so by the drizzle, and we moved with care, using the rope to help us walk our way down the embankment. We moved as quickly as we could, but it still took us almost twenty minutes to reach the bottom.

We crouched behind an outcropping of rock and peered into the flat area that stretched out before us. The empty, dug-out feel of the mountain reminded me of the Ashland Rock Quarry not too far from here. The place where Alexis James had met her death two months ago.

Donovan looked through the binoculars again. “It seems like everyone’s gone home already,” he murmured.

“I don’t even think there are any guards around.”

“Why would there be?” I asked. “Nobody around here’s going to be dumb enough to steal from Tobias Dawson. Especially not since he’s such good friends with Mab Monroe. Besides, even if somebody did steal something, he’d look a little conspicuous driving a bulldozer down into the city, now wouldn’t he?”

Caine snorted at the image, but he didn’t argue with my logic.

“Come on,” I said. “Let’s get this over with.”

We eased out from behind the rocks and walked forward.

The metal equipment cast out all sorts of dark, twisted shadows, made even murkier by the drizzle and thick clouds overhead. A couple of tall, parking lot-style lights next to the mine entrance burned like skinny yellow lanterns. The lights made it easy enough to navigate our way through the equipment maze. But the rain couldn’t quite drown out the smell of exhaust and gasoline that hung in the air like smog.

The stone’s murmurs grew louder and sharper the farther I walked into the basin, until the vibrations rang in my ears like a never-ending death wail. I gritted my teeth and blocked out the noise. There was nothing I could do to help the stone. I just didn’t have that kind of power.

Only time could do that now — if the mountain could ever truly recover from being so viciously brutalized.

It took us about ten minutes of walking before we were within sight of the mine office, a small building made out of sheet metal and fiberglass, covered up with whitewashed wooden boards. A couple of security lights glowed over the front door. I peered into the darkness, but I didn’t see any guards patrolling around the building.

If Tobias Dawson did have a night shift, they’d probably be farther up around the curve in the basin, stationed at the front entrance to the mined mountain. Not back here in the bottleneck where access was already restricted.

Still, I palmed one of my silverstone knives, just in case.

We crouched behind a bulldozer that was the closest one to the mining office. Nothing moved in the dark night. The drizzle had picked up and turned into a steady rain. A few damp tendrils had come undone from my ponytail. The rain had turned my chocolate locks an even darker brown, and I used the cold moisture to slick them back into place.

“Come on,” I whispered to the detective. “Let’s do this.”

I crept forward. After a moment, I heard Donovan’s boots squish in a puddle behind me. I smiled. Just like old times. If a mere two months ago could be considered old times.

I eased over to the front door of the mining office. A sign on the side read Dawson Mining Company. Once again, the first two i s in Mining had been transformed into Tobias Dawson’s rune — a lit stick of dynamite.

I wore the same kind of gardening gloves Donovan Caine did, so I had no qualms about reaching forward and trying the doorknob. Locked. Not a problem. I pulled off one of my gloves and reached for my Ice magic.

The cold, silver light flickered over my palm, and a few seconds later, I had two long, slender Ice picks. Donovan watched me work with a mixture of curiosity and resignation.

Less than a minute later, the lock slid home, and the door opened.

I threw the picks in a nearby puddle so they’d melt, pulled my glove back on, and eased into the building.

Donovan followed me and closed the door behind him. I stood still for a moment, letting my eyes adjust to the lack of light. With the darkness and clouds outside, the interior of the building was almost pitch-black, as if it were already midnight instead of creeping up on seven o’clock.

Once I was sure no guards were coming to interrupt us, I pulled a small flashlight out of my jacket pocket and flicked it on. Beside me, Donovan did the same.

We stood in a waiting room. Some chairs, a table, out-of-date magazines. A desk in the middle probably belonged to a secretary. Behind it, a corridor led farther back into the building. That’s where I headed, with the detective behind me.

The corridor ended at a closed door with a brass nameplate that read Tobias Dawson. Just whom I was looking for. I tried the knob. Locked, so I had to form two more Ice picks to open it. After I’d picked the lock, I turned the knob and held my breath, waiting. But no alarm sounded. Evidently, Dawson just secured his office as a precaution — or to keep his staff from snooping around while he was away. I stepped inside the room. The detective followed me.

I paused for a few seconds, taking in the view. Tobias Dawson’s office had just as much personality as the dwarf himself did because everything had a Western motif.

The desk consisted of several old-fashioned wooden barrels with a sheet of glass stretched over the top of them.

The art on the walls featured bucking broncos and Native American designs, perhaps Navajo, from the looks of them. One of the lamps on Dawson’s desk was shaped like a miniature cowboy boot. Another one resembled a curling lasso. I looked up. The dwarf even had a longhorn mounted over the door to the office — its stuffed head and horns at least.

“Somebody really needs to move to Texas,” I murmured.

“Forget that,” Donovan said. “What are we looking for?”

“Anything that might tell us why Tobias Dawson wants the Foxes’ land so badly.” I moved off to the right. “So see what you can find in his desk and in the filing cabinets.”

Donovan did as I asked. But before he started pulling open drawers, the detective stared at me. “And what are you going to do?”

“See if he has a safe stashed in here somewhere.”

Donovan shook his head, but he sat down in Dawson’s oversize chair and went to work, methodically opening, scanning, and closing all the files on the glass desk.

I went around the room and checked behind all the framed photographs, looking for a wall safe. Nothing. I ran my gloved hands over the cheap wood paneling, tapping it in several places. Again, nothing.

I curled and uncurled my hands into loose fists, thinking.

Since Tobias Dawson was friends and business partners with Mab Monroe, I imagined there were quite a few documents — legal and otherwise — he wouldn’t want his underlings seeing. Locking his office wouldn’t be secure enough. He’d need someplace to stash them. There had to be some sort of safe in here. A secret cubbyhole, hell, even a loose floorboard. And I needed to find it — fast.

We’d already been inside more than a minute. I wanted to be gone before the five-minute mark rolled around, if not before. Dawson might not have any obvious security here, but it was better not to take any unnecessary chances, especially since I was going to come back later and kill him.