Ghost Canyon (The John Decker Supernatural Thriller Series Book 7) by Anthony Strong (ebooks that read to you .TXT) 📕

The paramedics had finished strapping Sasha’s body to the stretcher. They hoisted it between them and started off back down the path toward the old ghost town.

Charlie waited for the two remaining members of the search and rescue team to tag along behind, then followed up the rear with his partner, casting nervous glances back toward the mine. When they were far enough away that he could no longer see the yawning black hole in the mountainside, Charlie slipped the gun back into its holster, but even so he kept a hand on it, ready to draw should the need arise.

“You going to tell dispatch what you told me?” Glenn asked as they made their way down the narrow trail.

“Not much choice. It’s the truth.”

“Good luck getting them to take you seriously.” Glenn wiped a sheen of the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. “I’m your partner. I know you wouldn’t invent a crazy story like this, and I’m still not sure I believe it.”

“I know,” Charlie said. He didn’t need to be told how crazy his story sounded. He tapped the body cam affixed to his torso. “But I have proof. My camera was rolling the whole time.”

“I don’t know, it’s pretty dark in those tunnels. What if it didn’t record anything but blackness.”

Charlie nodded toward Colbeck and Enrique. “Then I have two witnesses to back me up.”

“Let’s hope that’s enough.”

“It will have to be.” Charlie was feeling better the further they walked down the trail. Soon this would be someone else’s mess, and he could try and forget what he’d seen in the Ghost Canyon Mine. The problem was, he didn’t think he would.

Chapter Twelve

Robyn Miller observed the commotion on her property with growing dread. A third person had lost their life inside the mine. A member of the search team. And by all accounts it was violent. There really was something up there, although the cops had been tightlipped about exactly what.

Robyn felt bad about the death. It was dreadful, of course. Yet she couldn’t help wondering how this would affect the future of the business she was trying to build here. Who in their right mind would want to take a tour in a mine linked to such a recent and horrific tragedy? It was hardly a fun day out when all anyone could think about were the number of deaths that had occurred there. Not that anyone would be going anywhere near that mine in the immediate future. After the cops returned from the mine, a whole bunch of people showed up in a variety of vehicles. There was even a SWAT team who actually drove their armored truck up the trail. No mean feat, since the path wasn’t wide enough for a regular car, let alone a hulking tactical assault vehicle.

She was confined to the hotel’s saloon bar for most of the evening, along with the surviving geologist, Carlton, and Tieg. The dog sat at her feet looking bewildered as a parade of officials came and went, asking questions, taking the opportunity to confer under air conditioning, and occasionally helping themselves to tall glasses of iced tea from jugs she’d put out on the bar top. It was during one of these frequent refreshment visits that she overheard a couple of senior police officials discussing their next move. The SWAT team were going to enter the mine, even though it was getting dark. The buzz of activity increased in anticipation of this event. There was even a helicopter circling overhead. At first she thought it was a police chopper monitoring the action on the ground, but then she spotted the logo emblazoned on the side as it made a low pass over the town. The local news station. Her heart fell. This would be plastered all over Channel 10 by midnight.

Then, in no time at all, the mood changed.

Two men in khaki pants and matching white polos showed up like a pair of escapees from some golf tournament. They arrived in an unmarked sedan so dull that it screamed government. This pissed off the cluster of LVMPD captains and lieutenants, at least judging by the heated exchange that started in the hotel lobby and then spilled into the saloon. Maybe they felt their toes were being stepped on, or maybe they just didn’t like the newcomers, who were obviously Feds. Either way, the dynamics of the situation shifted. Within thirty minutes the SWAT vehicle was back, recalled before the heavily armed team even entered the mine.

A couple of uniformed officers erected A-frame barricades across the entrance to the trail and stuck a sign in the dirt which read, AREA CLOSED, and in smaller lettering underneath, BY ORDER OF LVMPD.

After that, the police activity subsided. Cruisers and unmarked vehicles pulled U-turns in the street and headed back toward the city. It felt like an exodus, which was weird because they still had not found the two missing geologists, and if anyone knew what was attacking people in the mine, they weren’t saying.

Pretty soon there were only a couple of vehicles left. A lone police cruiser was parked near the barricades with a bored officer staring out across the dusty landscape at the mostly dark ramshackle buildings. He was obviously on guard duty even though there was no-one around except her and Carlton to even attempt a trip up to the mine. And the two Feds, of course.

They parked their car out front in the spot previously occupied by the geologist’s quad cab, which the police department had towed away a couple of hours earlier after bundling the traumatized geologist into the back of an ambulance.

The Feds themselves were standing on the wide veranda out front. One of them leaned on the railing and stared toward the trail leading to the Ghost Canyon Mine, while the other paced back and forth talking on his phone. Afterward, he slipped the phone into his pants pocket and made his way inside with