Copyright 2013 - All Rights Reserved
Hustle By Claire Chilton
23
Deadfall
Jacob wiped the sweat off his brow with the tail of his khaki shirt before taking another glance at the map. According to the markings, the Heart should be buried inside the volcano. He sighed when he peered at the compass, feeling guilty for taking it.
I shouldn't have left her behind.
He shook his head.
It's for the best. Meyer wants her, not me. She'll be safe in the village. I can get the Heart and then go back to find her. That way, Meyer won't get his hands on her.
All thoughts of his father and her father had evaporated when she was wrapped in his arms last night. Whatever had happened in the past was history. He'd realized that for most of his life he'd lived in his father's shadow. The Hawk was his father, not him. His father's company was just another part of the past that was weighing him down. He loved exploring the world and finding hidden treasures, but not for prestige or the title of being the Hawk. That was Douglas Hawkins's life, not his.
When we get back to the UK, I'm leaving the company. I've got enough money to do what I want, and this is what I want.
While all his friends had been traveling the world and experiencing new things, he'd been keeping track of accounts at Hawkins Shipping and chasing the treasures his father had never found, chasing the father he'd never had.
Well, now I've found him.
Once he'd realized that, everything had become so clear.
Get the Heart, keep Ellie safe and get off this island.
At first, this whole journey had been about his father, saving him, saving his reputation. But whatever his father had been doing here, if it involved men like Meyer, his father had been no angel. It wasn't his cross to bear anymore. Jacob's life had been on hold for his father until he'd met Ellie. Now he had her, he'd found his own place in the world, and it wasn't at Hawkins Shipping.
She'll forgive me for leaving her like that.
He nodded as he brushed through the trees to find the dark, cavernous entrance to the volcano before him. He smiled.
She'll forgive me when I give her the Heart of Fortune.
***
Ellie was unsure if she was going in the right direction, so she stopped to rest for a moment beside a large palm tree. She hadn't heard gunshots for a while, and she was relieved by the silence. The constant crack of shots being fired had been wearing on her already tense nerves.
What are they shooting at anyway? Jacob's lame ass wouldn't warrant that many bullets, plus he's such a—
Her thoughts froze as she glanced up to see the dark granite of a volcano above her. It towered through the trees like a daunting fortress. She swallowed her fear of it and hurried through the trees, hoping she was on the right side of the massive structure.
She stopped when she came to a solid wall of volcanic rock.
Crap, where's the entrance?
She had a choice of left or right. She decided to go right and follow the wall, hoping the entrance to it wasn't too far away. The wall of rock was cold to touch. Overgrown trees and plants climbed up it, making it difficult to trek around it. She climbed over wild tree roots that were sticking up out of the earth and brushed by large plants with leaves and thorns, skirting around what she could to stay beside the wall.
As the shrubs and trees began to diminish, she came to a clearing. She stopped at the large craggy opening to the base of the volcano, staring at it in awe. It looked like a jagged open mouth with sharp rocks for teeth. She shivered as every essence of her being told her not to go in there.
She gritted her teeth. Instincts aside, she knew she had to go inside. On impulse, she pulled the gun out of her waistband and leveled it at the entrance of the cave. She held it with two hands, one around the handle of the gun and the other hand around her wrist, bracing it for impact. Then she quietly walked into the volcano.
There was a glow in the distance from a lit torch. She stared at Jacob, who was brushing moss off the wall he stood beside. He hadn't noticed her presence. He was staring intently at the wall instead.
She leveled the gun on his back, planning to take him by surprise. But just the sight of him sent her blood boiling.
"Looking for my heart?" she said as she stepped towards him. Her voice echoed around the chamber.
Jacob spun around, his eyes wide. "Ellie, no!" he cried as he raced towards her.
She narrowed her eyes and stared down the barrel of the gun, but she couldn't pull the trigger.
Damn it.
She lowered the gun as he bounded in her direction at full speed. "Stay back or I'll—"
She widened her eyes when he didn't slow down and plowed straight into her.
Son of a bitch!
She hit the ground with his heavy body pinning her down. She raised her arms to try to punch him, but he covered her body with his, capturing her beneath him.
She heard the rush of an explosion and peered up through the gap between his arms to see flames shooting out in the air inches above them.
She widened her eyes as the fires of Hell lit up the cave in a red glow. Waves of heat singed her skin, causing instant beads of sweat to appear on her brow.
After a few seconds, the fire went out, plunging the cave into darkness lit only by dim torchlight.
Jacob raised his head and peered back before turning to face her with thunder in his eyes. "Of all the stupid..." He shook his head. "Follow me and keep your fucking head down."
He pointed to the wall. "You see that line?"
She glanced at the wall of the cave, noticing a thick line carved into it. "Er, yes."
"Keep your head below it, or you'll set off the trap." He pointed ahead. "Go to where the torch is, but not past it. Do you understand? Do not go past the torch, or you'll set off another trap."
Ellie gulped and nodded. "Okay."
Traps? What is this, Indiana Jones?
She glanced at Jacob.
More like Goonies.
"You first." He rolled off her and onto all fours, keeping his eyes on the line scraped into the wall.
She rolled onto her side and then scrambled onto all fours. She checked her crouched height against the line on the wall, breathing a sigh when she found herself well below the line that would trigger the trap.
She glanced back at Jacob. "Why should I go first?"
"So, if you fuck up, we both burn." His voice was dripping with sarcasm. He shook his head and glared at her. "If I'm behind you, I can warn you before your stupid head reaches that stupid line. What are you even doing here? I ask you to do one little thing—one thing—and you can't even manage that."
She scowled at him. "Oh, I'm sorry. Did you think I was on the payroll, oh great lord and master? What a fucking wake-up call this must be for you."
She turned and scurried forward across the cavern floor, keeping a cautious eye on the holes in the wall that seemed to randomly shoot out a fiery death.
"I prefer 'sir' to 'master'."
She narrowed her eyes when she heard the smirk in his voice. She peered over her shoulder and scowled at him. He wore a satisfied smile on his face as he stared at her backside.
"Enjoying the view?" She raised an eyebrow.
He glanced up to her face and then tilted his head sideways as if considering the question before nodding. There was a sparkle of amusement in his dark eyes and a smirk of approval on his lips.
She scowled and scurried faster to get away from him. The man was infuriating. How dare he try to be cute after what he'd done!
She stopped when she got to the torch, which was lying on the cave floor. She glanced back to find Jacob standing behind her, smirking down at her.
"You can, er, get up now." Judging by the wide grin on his face, he was clearly enjoying seeing her kneel before him.
She jumped to her feet and placed her hands on her hips as she turned to face him. "I really don't know what you're grinning about." She glanced down at the gun in her left hand and then back to him.
"What? You're going to shoot me after I saved your dumb ass again? Don't bother, sweetheart. There are enough traps in this cave to kill me faster. And what the hell are you doing here? You were supposed to stay in the village."
"Oh, I see. You wanted me to cuddle up with Meyer's men?"
His face visibly paled. "What do you mean?" He widened his eyes. "They found the village?"
She frowned.
Is he on the level?
She shook her head.
He's been playing me from the start.
Her instinct told a different story, and in the past, she'd always relied on her instincts. But when it came to Jacob, she couldn't even read his body language, let alone work out what kind of person he was.
Which means he's a player.
What was it old dad used to say?
Words and intentions are just a smokescreen for how people want to be perceived. The reality lies in their actions.
Jacob's actions had not been good in any way. Since she'd met him, he'd pinned her to a bed, chased her across the world and cuffed her to a boat. What did his actions show about him? She frowned.
That he's horny?
She shook her head again. Okay, he might have saved her life once, but then he'd left her in the middle of nowhere with mercenaries closing in on her. None of it made sense. There was no logical reason for any of his actions, which meant that they must have been a smokescreen.
"Er, yep, but I got away." She decided to play his game, but she found it difficult to keep the anger out of her voice. "So, what's going on in here, traps?" She gestured at the wall he'd been examining when she first arrived at the cave.
"Yeah, this place is booby trapped in ways I've never seen before. Check this out." He pointed to the wall he'd been brushing earlier.
She peered at the dark wall and then frowned. Beneath a layer of moss that he'd brushed away were wooden cogs and levers. "What is it?"
"Another trap." Excitement lit up his eyes.
She understood the look. She was pretty sure she'd had it herself when she picked her first lock and run her first scam. "What does it do?"
"I dunno." He shrugged. "But if it's anything like the first one, it'll be a challenge getting past it."
She stared at the intricate cogs. If a pirate like Henry Rose had built all this, he'd have left a safe way past it. "Can I see the map?"
"Sure, you can hold onto it." He passed her the map and compass before picking up the torch and shining it down the tunnel of the cave.
She watched him explore the walls with the light for a moment, and then she shook her head before peering down at the map.
Their location was marked with a triangle, which she assumed meant volcano, but she was looking for more. If you made a map, you'd have instructions on how to get safely through it.
Jacob picked up a rock and threw it down the tunnel. When it landed on the ground, the floor dropped away ahead of them, leaving a gaping chasm down the tunnel.
She peered down, gasping at the sharp spears embedded in the bottom of the pit. Skeletal remains were skewered on some of the spears. "Pirate shish-kebab," she muttered.
After a few seconds, the cogs beside her ground into action, and the floor reappeared.
Jacob glanced up at the ceiling. "There's no way across this."
She peered back at the map, looking through the lens of the compass. The compass point was facing south, but she was certain that they were facing north. She frowned at the compass. On impulse, she pushed the petals of it. The glass lenses turned like a wheel around the center. The mechanism clicked and stopped at a hundred and eighty degrees. North was now south. She peered through the glass and gasped. The markings had become a map of the volcano. She read the words under the first marking, which was a symbol for fire:
FIRE IN THE HOLE.
That had to be the first trap.
"This is impossible." Jacob was still staring at the tunnel ahead. "I don't think we're going to be able to get through. It's like the walk of death."
She glanced at the next lens, noticing a symbol of a centered path drawn on the map. "Walk the plank." She read the words marked beneath it.
"What?" He turned to face her.
She picked up another rock and threw it down the center of the tunnel, aiming for dead center. The rock landed in the middle of the path a few yards ahead of her. The ground dropped away again, but this time leaving a narrow plank along the center of it, a path to the other side.
She grinned and placed her foot on the precarious path before turning to Jacob. "We just have to walk the plank. Watch your step." She turned and began making her way to the other side.
She felt the plank wobble as he followed her. "How did you work that out?"
She smiled. "I know how pirates think." She waved the map. "Plus, there's a map."
The plank was a narrow path, offering a painful death to anyone who fell off it. She concentrated on keeping her balance as she hurried to the other side, grateful for the light from Jacob's torch.
"There was nothing on the map when I read it." She heard Jacob grumble behind her.
"The compass is upside down. If you turn the lenses, it shows another map." She called back with a grin on her face. "Every good thief makes a plan for getting in and getting back out."
"Of course, magnetic poles in volcanos are known to be opposite. He must have been a damn good cartographer to make a map like that. I don't think they even knew that back in the day."
She shook her head. Of course, he was a science geek. Jimmy would love him. "Yeah, I guess," she said as she stepped off the plank and onto the path at the other side. She moved aside, so there was room for Jacob to walk off the plank beside her.
Jacob pointed to a lever in the wall. "What's next?"
She peered down at the map. "Get measured fer yer chains." She read the line beneath the symbol of a cage. She glanced ahead. There were no cages, just a long dark tunnel.
"Do you know what that means?"
She glanced at him. "Yeah, it meant a pirate was being fitted into a gibbet cage for punishment, but there's no gibbet cage here."
He glanced at the lever. "Do we pull it?"
She shivered. She didn't like not knowing what was coming next, especially in this place, but she'd come this far, and she wanted to know what was at the end of this map. She knew that if she didn't find out, it would haunt her. She nodded for him to pull the lever.
His arm wrapped around her waist, and he pulled her closer to him before he pushed down the old lever.
Cogs ground against each other, and she heard the sound of metal clinking before a cage that was suspended on a long chain dropped out of the ceiling and hung in front of them. She felt his body jump as the deadly looking gibbet cage bounced in the air ahead of them.
"What are we supposed to do with that?" She peered at the human-shaped cage.
He stared at it in awe for a moment. "I think we're supposed to get in it."
"Are you fucking kidding? We won't fit in that, and it looks like a death trap." As she spoke, the walls of the tunnel began to shift inwards, and she could hear the sound of more cogs turning.
"I don't think we have a choice," he cried as the path ahead began to crumble away, making room for the narrowing walls. He grabbed the cage door and pulled it open, bundling her inside it before jumping in after her and pulling the door shut.
The cage was a tight fit with his large body pressed against her. "Now what?" she spoke into his chest.
"I don't kn—"
The cage jerked upwards as the chain it was hanging from tightened. She could hear the grinding of metal as the cage began to rise up into the ceiling of the tunnel.
"I guess we're going up to the next floor," he said as the cage elevated upwards.
"Let's hope the lift doesn't break down." She peered down at the rapidly narrowing space of the tunnel.
When she glanced up, she sighed, glad to see a new level of the volcano coming into view. She wished the cage would hurry up. Being this close to Jacob was driving her senses crazy. His hot body pressing against her was bringing back memories of last night that she didn't want.
He glanced down at her smiling. "Nearly there."
His breath warmed the skin on her face. She glanced up, finding her lips only inches from his. His eyes clouded over as if he were about to kiss her. A part of her wanted him to.
No, no, no!
She tried think of the least sexy thing she could say. "Do you think there will be rotten corpses up there?"
That seemed to do the trick. He frowned and glanced up at the dark chamber they were elevating towards. "I, er, dunno."
She sighed. Crisis averted. It was either corpses or telling him to imagine his mother naked. That always worked better than a cold shower on most men.
She could feel his eyes on her, but refused to meet them until they were out of the cage. He was dangerous enough to her betraying libido without being crushed up against him.
She looked up when the grinding gears came to halt, thankful to find that Jacob was now staring back over his shoulder rather than at her.
She peered past him to see a vast chamber with a sandy floor ahead of her.
Jacob pushed open the cage door and stepped back out of it. She hurried after him, eager to get out of the close confines.
He scanned the room frowning. "There's nothing here."
She glanced around the room before peering at the map. There was a symbol of a chest with four words carved beneath it. "X marks the spot," she said.
Jacob turned to face her. "What X? There's nothing here."
She walked around the cave, studying the floor. It was softer than the ground in the rest of the cave. She dug her foot into it, amazed to find soil beneath her feet. "How come there's mud in a volcano?"
She dragged her foot through the soil, coming to a halt when her foot caught on something solid. She peered down to see a wooden beam buried in the dirt. "Hey, look at this."
Jacob hurried over and crouched near her feet. He began brushing away the soil. "There's something under here."
She traced the wood with her foot. When she'd finished, she stood back and stared at the shape of the wooden beams. Two beams crossed, spanning the room with a giant X. "Er, I think this is it. It has to be."
He stood up and stared at the massive cross. "The treasure is under this beam. We've found it!"
Ellie yelped when a cold hand wrapped around her neck, pulling her backwards. She widened her eyes when the blade of a knife pressed against her cheek, staring at it in horror. Had Henry Rose come back from Davy Jones's Locker to reclaim his treasure?
"I was hoping you'd say that." She heard Joseph Meyer's rough voice as his breath warmed her cheek. "Do an old man a favor, lad, and start digging." He threw a spade at Jacob.
Jacob scowled at him, his eyes darkening in response.
"Or I'll gut your girlfriend." Meyer threatened, moving the knife down Ellie's throat and pressing it against her collarbone.