Dangerous Treasure Read online

  Pete watched as the men walked over to the tent area. With that settled, he went to the medic’s tent to check on the injured worker. He was happy to find him coherent and chatting lightly with the doctor.

  “Everything good here?” he asked as he stepped inside the opening of the large canvas tent.

  “Sure, sure. Just keeping an eye on our patient for a bit since he took a nasty little blow to the head. He is going to spend the night here in one of the bunks and then we’ll see if he is fit for duty in the morning or if he needs to call it a dig.”

  “Very good. I’m going to get things settled out here then so these guys can get some sleep before morning,” he told them.

  “Goodnight,” they replied, practically in unison.

  The men from his crew had already made quick work of getting the tent area back in order during his brief trip to the medical tent. Several of them were securing the large pole that had fallen, so he went to assist them. This looked very bad for him to have such a mishap on the first day.

  ***

  From where Jana stood, she could see Pete Abernathy’s silhouette against the moonlight and felt a warm flush wash over her. Hurrying into her cabin, she tried to quickly discount the effect he already seemed to be having on her. It wasn’t acceptable to get involved with someone on the dig, so there was no use even considering such. Returning to her bed, she tucked herself beneath the covers and dozed off until the alarm sounded.

  The shower in her cabin was a disappointment with only lukewarm water, but she had worked in places with worse bathing conditions. She made quick work of getting clean and dressed, heading out the door a bit earlier than she planned to begin digging, as she knew that Hank would have a breakfast set up in the dining tent. He fed his crew every morning before work began if they were in a remote area, which was usually the case in his business. Grabbing coffee from the large brew pot near the entrance and a plate of eggs, bacon and toast, she made her way to sit beside him at his table. She was barely seated when Pete joined them, sitting directly opposite her with his own plate.

  “It’s going to be a glorious day. I can feel it in my bones!” Hank said happily, taking a bite of the breakfast sandwich he had put together for himself.

  “Let’s hope so,” Jana replied with a smile, not feeling as optimistic as he seemed to be.

  “Where is your spirit of adventure?” he chided.

  “Just remember you are paying me even if I come up empty-handed,” she replied with a grin.

  “You hurt me with that sort of defeatist attitude, Jana,” he replied.

  “Not defeated, just not feeling as sure of myself as you do,” she replied.

  “They are here. I can hear them singing to me from the dirt,” he replied.

  “I’ve heard of hearing voices before, but singing statues beneath the dirt?” Pete laughed.

  “I can’t help it if I am gifted like that,” Hank said. “Jana just likes to keep me from getting my hopes up. I know she is secretly just as excited as I am.”

  “Yes, I am. I’m positively giddy with anticipation,” Jana joked.

  “I know. I know, dear girl,” Hank replied. “Eat up. We have treasure awaiting us.”

  Jana laughed, continuing to eat her breakfast while avoiding staring directly at Pete Abernathy as if he were the sun. Still, she continued chatting lightly with him as Hank excused himself to go make some phone calls. By the time they exited the tent, Hank stood nearby, obviously in full-blown disagreement with someone named Pablo on the other end of his phone.

  “Not a good day for whoever Pablo is from the way Hank is shrieking at him,” Pete commented.

  “He’s all bark and no bite,” Jana shrugged. “Hank loves to act like he’s tough, but he’s just a big ole softy when it comes right down to it. I need to grab my tools and we’ll get right to work.”

  “You are going to start digging by hand?” Pete asked, following her toward her cabin.

  “We pretty much have to. If Hank’s information is correct, these statues aren’t buried very deep. Going in with even the smallest equipment risks doing significant damage, especially since the statues are pure gold other than the thin outer layer of alloy,” she replied.

  “If it’s gold, wouldn’t it be simple to know if it is there without digging? I mean, a good metal detector would pick it up, wouldn’t it?” Pete asked

  “The site registers heavy for metals, but there is no way of knowing if it is the statues or just debris from the previous building that was here. This used to be a ranch owned by a local blacksmith. Want to guess what his main business traffic was?” she told him with a grimace.

  “Horseshoes,” Pete said, his furrowed brow suddenly changing to understanding.

  “You’ve got it. So, we have a metal field on our hands. Maybe all the discarded horseshoes that have made their way into the ground will bring us luck,” Jana replied.

  “How did the statues get way out here?” Pete asked, obviously not having been afforded the information that Hank had given her over the phone and in the car on the way in.

  “The gold rush. Everyone was digging up gold all over the place out here. One of the miners found a huge gold mine up in those mountains,” Jana told him, pointing toward the nearby peaks that separated this ranch from the Native American reservation just beyond them. “The story goes that, in order to keep it safe, he buried it, but later grew paranoid that people were following him and would steal it from him. So, he dug it up and took it to a friend . . . a blacksmith. They melted it down and made gold statues of it. Then coated them with a thin layer of common alloy metal to cover up what they really were,” she told him.

  “And Hank believes this is the blacksmith and they were left here?” Pete asked.

  “This ranch has been abandoned for years. It was purchased several decades ago by a man who then grew ill and was never able to relocate to it from another state. When he died recently, his son came out to the property with realtors to prepare it for sale. Instead, he found bones where the old blacksmith building had once stood. He called local law enforcement and they came out to investigate, finding identification documents that seemed to indicate the body belonged to Melton Howard. Hank got wind of it through a contact here in the police department and jumped on it before anyone else could get wind of it,” she told him.

  “The gold rush was in the mid-1800s. How have the statues managed to be here so long?” he asked.

  “The blacksmith shed stood for years. It didn’t collapse and begin to rot until after the place was purchased by the recently deceased owner. The body was apparently under the floor,” she told him.

  “Wait. So, someone murdered him? I mean, why would he have been under the floor?” Pete asked, now intrigued.

  “That remains to be seen. The police only recently released the property after their investigation. They have yet to issue a cause of death or confirm that the remains are Melton Howard,” she replied.

  “Hank is sinking a lot of money into a dig that might lead to nothing,” Pete replied.

  “That’s Hank for you. He goes with his gut instinct. I do have to admit that he is rarely wrong. If anyone else had called me out at the last minute on what some would deem a wild goose chase, I’d have said no,” Jana told him.

  “He seems to think highly of you, as well. He told me that you were the only one he would even think of letting do this dig for him,” Pete replied. “He tells me that you are from Dallas, too.”

  “Flattering, but I’ve known Hank a long time. If I had said no, he would have gotten someone else to do it. No way would he pass up a find just because I wasn’t available. You are from Dallas, as well?” she added.

  “Born and raised. Small world, isn’t it?” Anyway, I am sure you are right, but only after he had exhausted hours of begging,” Pete laughed.

  “Yeah, he’s not fond of being turned down when he wants you to do something,” she said. “I’ll be right back.”

  ***

  Pe
te watched as she disappeared into her cabin and returned only moments later with a large black bag draped heavily over her shoulder. He could hear the rattle of metal and surmised it must be pretty heavy.

  “Here, let me carry that for you,” he offered, reaching for it.

  “Oh no, I’m a big girl. I carry my own bags,” she laughed.

  “I didn’t mean to offend,” he said, unsure if he had crossed some line. He wasn’t exactly used to working so closely with females. In the military, he had been a combat engineer and dropped into places, built what was needed and then left. Even in civilian life, most of his work involved male counterparts, not intelligent, attractive females like Jana Sebastian. He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t drawn to her from the moment he had seen her. Too bad she was a colleague.

  “You didn’t,” she replied glibly, hiking over toward the dig site without waiting on him. He followed along, still feeling as if he had stepped over some line with her.

  “Alright, well I’m going to go lay out the next segment of the dig. If you don’t find anything here, Hank has informed me that you will want to move quickly to the next,” he said.

  “Hank is right,” she said, already on the ground and focused on the tools she was laying out around her. He began walking away as she called out to some of the workers to assist her with removing topsoil. In moments, she was out of view, surrounded by men carefully cutting and removing debris and sections of earth with small gardening spades and their hands.

  As the day passed, he found himself glancing in her direction from time to time. Even in work clothes and a cap covering her auburn ponytail, she was quite a striking woman. High cheekbones flattered the piercing green-flecked eyes and full lips that adorned the porcelain complexion of her face. She was petite and athletic in appearance. Jana Sebastian was the kind of woman you could imagine running a marathon and then donning an evening gown for some society ball. She was just exactly the kind of woman who could never be interested in a common sort like him, yet he found himself thinking about her anyway.

  As he watched, the area around her suddenly became a whirlwind of activity. Something was happening, but he couldn’t quite figure out what it was from his vantage point. Had they found what they were looking for?

  Chapter 3

  “Find Hank,” Jana told one of the nearby workers. She looked at the ground in disbelief as the large dark figure began to peek out at her from the earth. Hank was right. It wasn’t that she had doubted his knowledge, but this whole thing had just sounded so far-fetched. Yet, here she was, looking at what appeared to be the first of what should be twenty statues. She worked slowly around it with her brush, bringing more and more of it into view.

  “What do you have?” Hank said excitedly, quickly making his way to where Jana was kneeling on the ground, still brushing away dirt from the statue.

  “Looks like we might have the first of the statues,” she told him. “I’ve almost got the dirt worked away from it and should have it free in a few minutes. I knew you would want to be here to see it come out of the ground.”

  “Oh, yes. Work faster, Jana. Work faster!” he squealed.

  “I knew you would be excited, but you’re going to have to be patient. I would imagine that you want it as pristine as possible. Looks like he only wrapped it in some sort of cloth and that has deteriorated, but it seems to have cushioned the statue against damage from what I see,” she offered.

  “This is good news. Of course, the outer layer of metal should protect the inner gold,” he said.

  “Assuming there is inner gold,” Jana told him.

  “Don’t be hurtful, Jana,” Hank joked with her, watching intently as she continued to work away the dirt. The nearby workers had stopped what they were doing and were all waiting breathlessly to see what Jana was about to pull from the ground. They didn’t have to wait long, as only moments later, she pulled the heavy statue fully from the ground with freshly gloved hands.

  “It’s beautiful,” she said a bit sarcastically, holding up a statue of a rather plain, portly woman wearing an apron for him to view. It weighed quite a bit and was hard to lift, but she managed to hand it off to Hank as he moved in closer.

  “Ah, the traditional view of beauty has changed quite a bit, hasn’t it?” he said.

  “Just a tad,” she laughed, watching as he studied the statue closely.

  “It’s very heavy. This lass is full of gold,” he smiled.

  “I’ll let the two of you get to know one another. I’m going to take a lunch break while these guys continue moving the topsoil in this area. Then, I have nineteen more statues to find,” she told him, getting to her feet and dusting herself off.

  “I can’t believe you’ve found the first one already. We are only halfway through the first day. This is fantastic!” Hank exclaimed, walking away with the statue cradled closely against his chest. He disappeared inside the mobile trailer he had brought in for himself as Jana made her way to the dining tent for lunch.

  “So, you’ve actually found what he was looking for already?” Pete asked, stepping into the line behind her.

  “Well, I’ve found one of them. It will give him something to do while I look for the rest,” she replied.

  “That was fast. At this rate, you’ll be done in a few days,” he said.

  “I don’t know about all that. There is nothing to say that all of the statues are buried in the same place. They could be all in a row, randomly scattered around or in completely different areas. How long it takes depends on where they end up being found. We will go through the grid you have set up now and if we don’t see that we are finding them there, I’ll ask you to set up a new grid based on what we know at that time,” she said.

  “Yes, it isn’t my first dig site, but I have to admit most of them take much longer. I’ve never been on one where what we are looking for is buried treasure, so to speak,” he replied.

  “I have to say it is a first for me, as well. I just hope it doesn’t turn into some sort of wild goose chase. There is no concrete evidence that all twenty of the statues exist. Even if they do, we may not find them all. It may become a matter of how long Hank is willing to look before all is said and done,” she told him quietly. Sitting down with their food, they continued to discuss the artifacts until Hank came in, interrupting their conversation.

  “I’m going to take the first statue into San Diego early in the morning. I have a guy meeting me there first thing to authenticate and appraise it for me. I trust that the two of you can hold things down here for me?” he told them.

  “Sure, not a problem,” Jana told him.

  “I’ll be there for a couple of days getting that done and taking care of a few other things I need to tend to. I’m going to go ahead and give you the spare keys to my site trailer and the safe in case you find anything else in my absence,” he told her.

  “We will keep the work going. Just give me a call when you know about the authentication. I know you’ll be ready for me to stop digging if it turns out we don’t have the real thing on our hands. I will certainly give you a call if I find any more of your little treasures,” she told him.

  “I can always count on you,” he said, handing her a small set of keys. She tucked them into a pocket and nodded. She couldn’t help but notice the way Pete had watched the exchange intently, but interjected nothing into the conversation. Turning back to him, she took a sip of her drink and studied his face for a moment, noting once again how incredibly attractive he was.

  “You know, I think we should celebrate what a great start we are off to,” he told her.

  “Yeah, how do you propose we do that?” she asked.

  “Well, I’ve already told Hank that I want to go into San Diego tonight. How about you come with me and we go out to dinner?” he said.

  “Are you asking me out on a date?” she asked, undeniable butterflies stirring about her midriff.

  “Of course not. I have a feeling you don’t date the help,” he said. “I
could just use the company and it looks like you are going to be plenty busy in the coming days. It would be a nice break for you and you could pick up anything you might need while we’re there.”

  “I’d hardly classify you as the help. You are a colleague and, based on the perfection of the site grid, quite good at your job,” she replied, debating if she should go or not.

  “Well, thank you. Considering your well-known expertise and experience, that is a huge compliment, especially after last night’s fiasco,” he replied.

  “You are certainly welcome and you know what, I am going to accept your offer. I do need to go into town and a nice dinner would be great,” she told him, not sure what she was doing, but unable to stop herself.