Through her slit eyes, Maria studied the woman. Her golden tan skin came from either hours of outdoor time or a very good tanning bed. Her blonde hair hung beautifully down her back, the color from a bottle. Was her hair originally brown, like her father’s, or something else? It was easy to see how Grant had fallen for her. Natalie had striking facial features—high cheek bones and a sexy, female version of a … cleft chin.
If Maria’s legs hadn’t been strapped together and if she’d had any muscle control at all, she would have kicked herself.
Natalie, Grant’s latest romantic fling, had an uncanny resemblance to the two men who had just tried to kill Maria—Clyde and Dillan. If Natalie was say, for example, their sister, that would make all three of them children of Nathan Porter, the assistant to Steven Veil whose riddle had been held over Maria’s head as ransom in the kidnapping of Justin.
Maria felt more than ever like vomiting. Oh, the sick games some people played. They might not be Tehran terrorists, but the three siblings were just as conniving, manipulative, and evil.
Natalie had arrived in Kanab days before Justin was kidnapped, and she had been at the reservoir the day Maria and Jim had stuck their fingers in the water and called up a skeleton. That was the night Justin disappeared.
Were her brothers in Kanab too, or had she taken Justin all on her own? With her good looks, it would have been easy for her to coax Justin from his bed. He was an eight-year-old idiot boy after all.
And was the father Nathan Porter in on it too?
But why? What had been their end game? If they had wanted to figure out the solution to the Veil riddle, certainly they could have extorted that out of the old man years ago. Why go to all the trouble to take Justin and force Maria’s hand?
Maria’s head spun. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe she was letting her imagination run away with her.
But maybe not.
The theory would be easy to prove wrong. All they had to do was take a look at Natalie’s birth certificate. Check whether she was related to a Nathan, Clyde, or Dillan Porter. Find out where she lived. All of it would take Ms. Tuttle less than fifty seconds.
More than ever Maria tried to open her eyes wide enough to get the attention of the medic.
Nope.
Maria attempted another scream.
Nothing.
As if Rod sensed her thoughts, he looked at the medic and asked, “Is everything okay?”
“Her heart beat sped up. She might be coming out of her meds,” the medic answered.
“Is that normal?”
“No, it’s not. Whatever that Indian medicine man gave her to eat has been messing with my drugs. Hang on.” The medic moved toward the IV that hung at Maria’s side. He flipped the drip line with his index finger and thumb to make sure it was still working. “I’ll up her dose. We still have another twenty minute ride to the hospital.”
No! In Maria’s mind the word sounded so clear. So obvious. Her mouth just couldn’t manage to follow through with the command to make it audible.
Fear and concern covered Rod’s face. “She must be in so much pain.” He gripped her ankle harder as if trying to give her strength.
“We’re going to take care of her, don’t worry.”
A warming sensation crept into the veins in Maria’s arm. Seconds later her whole body felt numb.
Stop!
Natalie.
Natalie Porter.
She’s the kidnap—
Nothing but blackness.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
The Jarbidge Mountains in northeastern Nevada are home to a legendary Bigfoot-like creature known as "Tsawhawbitts" to the local Shoshone Indians or "Jahabich" to the nearby Nez Perce Indians. Indeed, the name "Jarbidge" is a corruption of the various Indian names for the region. The Jarbidge Mountains had a dark and ominous reputation among the early Native American peoples who lived nearby.
“THE LOST ROSS MINE” THE GEO ZONE. HTTP://WWW.THEGEOZONE.COM/ TREASURE/NEVADA/ TALES/NV006A.JSP
The gurney wheels rattled on the cement. Rod held Maria’s hand, walking briskly at her side.
Helicopter blades slowed somewhere in the distance.
Double doors opened in front of her.
People talked.
Monitors chimed.
STOP!
Maria needed to think.
So much was going on.
She had come back into consciousness with the same sentence on her lips that was there when her mind had been forced into blackness twenty minutes earlier.
Natalie Porter is the kidnapper.
But how could she get that knowledge from her mind into Rod’s?
Today was the last day to find Justin. She was out of time, and she couldn’t get a simple message to anyone. What Maria needed was for someone to take the muffling oxygen mask off her face.
Ignoring the pain in her body, she tried to move but to no avail.
The gurney traveled through another set of doors. A red “emergency” sign glowed ahead and abruptly the forward motion stopped.
A man in a white lab coat bustled toward Rod and the medic. “I’m Dr. Kincade, the anesthesiologist. They’re prepping her surgical room right now. I’ll take her from here. Sign this.” He shoved an iPad into the medic’s hand.
No. She couldn’t go into surgery. What if she never came out? Who would tell Beth about Justin? Who would save him?
“There you go.” The medic handed the iPad back to the anesthesiologist.
Justin thought I was invincible.
Maria tried to scream. The oxygen mask mocked her in return.
But Justin was wrong.
The doctor took a hold of the gurney and began to roll it forward. Rod moved with it.
“Sir,” said the anesthesiologist. “You need to let go. You can’t come into surgery.”
Rod tightened his grip on Maria’s hand. She tried to squeeze his back, but her muscles wouldn’t engage.
Leaning over her body, Rod positioned his mouth close to Maria’s ear. “I love you, Maria Branson. You have to make it through this.” The tenderness of his words was emphasized by a gentle kiss on her temple.
Now!
With every ounce of strength Maria could muster, she turned her head into Rod’s cheek. The oxygen mask over her nose and mouth slipped several inches to the side.
Her lips were numb. Her mind was shutting down, giving its farewell like actors at a final curtain call.
“Natalie.” Maria didn’t recognize her own voice. Her tongue must have been as large as a camel’s.
She spoke again. “Natalie …”
Rod pulled his face back, utter surprise registering on his face.
Maria’s head lolled. “… is the kidnapper.”
The anesthesiologist pushed the mask back over Maria’s face and pushed the gurney away from Rod.
The curtain fell on the stage of Maria’s mind.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The unincorporated town of Jarbidge sits in the 113,167-acre Jarbidge Wilderness. A thirty-foot-tall giant is said to lurk nearby. Local legend claims the giant named Tsawhawbitts grabbed anyone who ventured into his canyon, put them into a basket, and carried the victims to his cave where he’d eat them. The Shoshone chased Tsawhawbitts into the cave, and imprisoned this man-eating monster by blocking the entrance with boulders.
“EXPLORING AMERICAN MONSTERS: NEVADA,” BY JASON OFFUTT, MYSTERIOUS UNIVERSE.ORG, JANUARY 7, 2016.
Maria didn’t think you were supposed to be able to dream when under anesthesia, but she couldn’t seem to stop. Even though she deeply wished she could.
The walls of the Tehran prison were painted in colorful murals. Some of the pictures depicted nursery rhymes—Humpty Dumpty being the most notable—while others portrayed the horrid scenes Maria had witnessed when she’d been a prisoner there. Part of the torture she was subjected to by the terrorists was that of being made to watch the death of each of her team members. As if being graded on their creativity, the terr
orists killed each of them in a different way.
Alex had been beheaded by a machete. He was the first one to go.
Jerry was shot point blank. It had been mercifully quick.
Not so with Deborah. She was starved to death. It took her a couple weeks to pass away, and Maria was forced to see her every day during the ordeal. In the end, Maria was sure it was an infection that killed her, but the intent had been there. Evil and repugnant.
Gil was next. The very thought of Gil tore at Maria’s sanity. The terrorists had pulled out his teeth. The pain that man went through was unfathomable. But in the end, it was a blunt object to the back of the head that killed him.
Samantha was water boarded until she drowned, and Ryan … Ryan was hung, a brown bag placed over his head so he was in the dark when his last moments finally came.
All of them gone, but her.
The last mural on the wall was freshly painted. The pungent fumes still lingered in the air. It was Justin’s image. He was tied up and was being forced to drink something.
Please no, please no.
Maria woke up screaming.
A nurse was at her side in seconds. She spoke to Maria, but Maria couldn’t calm down enough to hear what she said. Screaming and thrashing about, she detached a few wires and tubes before the nurse slipped her syringe into the base of the IV bag and administered more medication.
Within moments, Maria slept again.
Maria’s second attempt to wake up went more smoothly. This time Rod sat at the edge of the bed. He was showered and shaven, looking at her with a kindness that helped calm Maria from the top of her head to her feet.
Rod held her hand. Fingers interlaced. The way his smile grew upon seeing Maria sent a wave of peace through Maria.
He bent down closer to her and whispered, “Hey, you.”
If Maria’s nose hadn’t been full of two little plastic tubes pumping oxygen into her nostrils she would have enjoyed the rustic smell he always carried about him. But as it was, she just had to imagine it.
“Hi,” she answered.
Was that me? Maria sounded like a seventy-year-old man with a significant cigarette addiction.
Ignoring her raspy voice, Maria asked a one-word question. “Justin?” She was surprised to see a continual heart beat on the monitor since it felt like all movement in her chest had stopped as she waited for Rod to answer.
“We found him. He’s okay.”
Euphoria rushed through Maria’s body.
Rod continued, “He was being kept in a vacation house Natalie rented just for that purpose. We’d been keeping our eyes on hotels for suspicious behavior so she circumvented the situation by renting privately. Sorry, that’s probably more detail than you want to hear right now.”
Maria shook her head fervently. “No. Tell me everything.”
Rod continued. “He’d been chained to a bed and hadn’t eaten for the last day—when Natalie took off to Jarbidge with Grant and me—but he was alive. He was so happy to see his parents.”
Involuntary tears gathered in the corner of Maria’s eyes.
“Nobody knows how you did it, Maria, but you saved Justin.” Rod paused. “Just like you saved me. You like to make that a habit, don’t you?” He smiled and caressed his thumb over the top of her hand.
Maria wanted to scream for joy and pain. Justin was alive! Beth had her boy back. But Maria was the reason Natalie had chosen the boy in the first place. She had seen Maria at the reservoir. She’d seen Justin was special to her and had used it against her.
Maria was no savior. She’d gotten lucky with Justin, but she hadn’t saved a single member of her black ops teams. She turned her face away from Rod’s gaze.
What?” Rod asked with concern. “What did I say? Justin’s back home. Everything is going to be okay thanks to you.”
Maria took as deep of a breath as she could without causing additional pain on her left side. “You didn’t say anything wrong. I’m so happy he’s okay,” Maria croaked. And she was. She had learned it was possible to be happy and profoundly sad at the same time.
Rod’s smile broadened. “And you,” he exhaled “are going to heal up just fine. The bullet was inches from your heart but didn’t hit anything critical. You did lose a ton of blood, but the doctors say you’re going to be okay.” His finger stroked the side of her face. There was warmth in the touch, and Maria recalled the words he’d spoken to her before she’d gone under for surgery. He’d said he loved her. Or at least she thought he had. Had she dreamt it? The past week of her life had been such a blur.
“Your parents are here. They flew into Twin Falls when they learned you were going in for emergency surgery. They stepped out for just a minute, but I’ll go get them for you. We’ve been having a great time chatting. Sounds like you were quite the child.”
Try as she might, Maria couldn’t stop a voracious yawn from escaping.
“I’m talking too much. You need to rest. I’ll tell you everything when you’re more awake.” He took a deep breath, looked into her eyes, and said, “Maria, you’re amazing.”
The next time Maria awoke, she felt as if she’d finally regained citizenship in the land of the living. She hurt, ached, throbbed and felt nauseated, but her mind felt stronger. Thoughts were coherent. She pushed the call button by her bedside. Moments passed. Then, both a nurse and Rod entered her door simultaneously.
Maria looked at them and said three words, “I am starving.”
Dinner consisted of red Jell-O, chocolate pudding, and apple juice. Rod sat on one side of the bed while Maria’s mother sat on the other. She was an attractive woman—in her mid-fifties with a full head of long dark hair that reached down her back. She was smaller framed than her daughter and had a much more delicate way about her. Her slender fingers continuously picked at the small balls of fiber that had pilled all over the well-used hospital blanket.
Maria’s father, a broad-shouldered man, paced back and forth in the room, a habit he’d had ever since Maria was a little girl. Worry lines around his mouth were deep and grooved—a consequence of having a daughter go missing in Tehran for eight months.
As Maria served question after question to Rod, he batted answers back like he was playing a championship World Series baseball game.
“Were Natalie and the game hunters siblings?”
“Yes, they were her younger brothers. Both have been on New Mexico’s most wanted list for the last several years.”
“What for?”
“A bunch of things. Recently they were believed to be involved with an armed robbery where several bank employees ended up dead. Not sure which of the two was the actual gunman.”
“It was Jim who shot Dillan?” Maria hesitated. She wasn’t sure if she had dreamed that fact.
Rod looked at Maria’s mother as if he needed to protect her from news she was too innocent to hear.
“Rod, Mom can take it. She’s had to live with me being in the CIA for almost a decade.”
“Yeah, Jim shot Dillan. He did it on the run with a handgun. The man is like a ninja.”
“And Clyde?”
“He lost too much blood from the knife wound. He died not long after Dillan.”
“And Natalie?”
“She’s in jail at Kanab for the moment. The FBI will take her up to Salt Lake City soon where they’ll question her father as well.”
“Was Nathan Porter in on it too?”
“The FBI’s not sure. But it turns out he’s a strange man. His wife left him when the kids were young. He took them out of school and lived off the grid so they could spend their days looking for treasure with him. Natalie said for an entire year they used metal detectors every day to comb California beaches. They were beaten at night if they didn’t find anything of value.”
“That’s awful.”
Rod nodded and Maria’s mother slid the apple juice closer to her. “Take another sip, sweetheart.”
Maria did as she was told.
“Nathan Por
ter took the job with Steven Veil hoping to get more information about the location of Veil’s hidden treasure.”
“I’m surprised he wasn’t successful getting Veil to tell him where the treasure was,” said Maria, apple juice still in hand.
“I was too until Natalie divulged Steven Veil’s biggest secret.”
“Which is?” Maria set down the drink and almost spilled it.
“Steven Veil has Alzheimer’s. He puts on a good show, but his cognitive loss is significant.” Rod was rubbing Maria’s leg as he talked. The sensation it gave her contributed to the goose bumps that popped out on her skin.
“Alzheimer’s? Does that mean …?”
“Yep. Veil has no idea where he hid his treasure. Nathan Porter has tried and tried to see if the old man left any hidden clues as to the location of the loot, but he hasn’t found anything yet, at least not according to Natalie. Several years back Nathan Porter started hiring soothsayers and psychics to find it, but none of them could. The man is desperate, out of money, and out of his mind, if you ask me.”
“That is so sad. But Natalie seemed so … I don’t know … normal.”
“I thought so too until Pete told me what she’s been saying to the FBI. She claims she’s a psychic herself and the voices told her you could find the treasure. She’d actually read about you in a Phoenix newspaper after you were involved with finding Dakota. Something sparked her curiosity, and she came to Kanab to meet you and see if you might be the person who could solve the riddle for them. After she saw you at the reservoir, when you touched the water and the skeleton came up, she was positive you were the one. But she also knew you weren’t the type she could just ask for help.”
Paranormal Mystery Boxset Books 1-3: Legends of Treasure Page 73
