Chapter 10
Mitch
The river had us in its jaws, tossing us end over end like driftwood. Muddy water slammed into my chest, punched the air from my lungs, and tried to drag me under.
Up ahead, Charlie's hair was plastered to her face so she couldn’t see, yet she fought damn hard to stay above the surface. Even half-drowned, she wasn't screaming. She was fighting. Focused. Goddamn impressive.
Doug was the opposite. The bastard just howled for help, his voice shredding with panic.
The torrent spun me, dunked me, threw me against submerged rocks, but every time I resurfaced, I searched for her. And hell, I could've sworn she was searching for me, too.
Up ahead, another sun-bleached tree jutted from the bank like skeletal fingers. This was our shot.
"Charlie! There's another tree!" I roared over the flood, but if she heard me, she didn't show it.
"Son of a bitch." I clawed my way toward her, inch by brutal inch, the river trying to rip my legs off while rocks shredded my shins.
When I finally got close enough, I pointed toward the bank. "Up ahead, left side … another tree." I lunged, grabbed her wrist, and hauled her against me. The current fought to rip her away, but I held on.
We spun again, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw Doug vanish beneath the sludge.
Shit. He's going to drown.
I leaned in to Charlie's ear. "Swim to that tree. Grab on and wait for me."
She turned to me, eyes wide and wild. "What? Where are you going?"
"To save Doug's ass. Now, go!" I shoved her toward the left bank, using the current to give her momentum. Swimming hard, she hauled herself through the torrent like a goddamn warrior.
I sucked in a breath and spun back to Doug.
He went under. Came up. Went under again. His mouth gaped like a dying fish. "Help!" he wailed. "I'm drowning!"
"Then swim, you damn fool," I muttered, though clearly, he couldn't. Christ.
As I waited for the right moment to get him, I risked a glance at Charlie. She lunged at the dead tree and wrapped her arms around the pale trunk, coughing up water.
Yes! She’d made it. Relief punched through me.
I turned back to Doug. The bastard still had his rifle strapped across his shoulder. How the hell was he managing to hold onto that?
"Doug!" I yelled, powering toward him with strong, wide strokes. I caught his arm just as he sank again, but he lunged at my neck like a damn octopus and nearly took us both under.
"Let go and float, ya stupid bastard!" I snarled.
"I can't," he sobbed. His chin quivered, and tears streaked his filthy face.
Bloody hell.
Shoving him in front of me, I flipped him onto his back, and fighting against the current to keep his head above water, I dragged his dead weight across the flooded creek toward Charlie.
The tree came up fast. I braced for impact and slammed into the trunk back-first. Pain shot through my ribs, but I held on.
With a grunt, I hauled Doug forward. "Grab the tree."
Doug gagged, choked, and flopped over the branch, clinging to it with his arms and legs as if he was wrestling a crocodile.
Grabbing a branch of my own to hang onto, I glanced at Charlie. “You good?”
She nodded, breathless. "Who are you?” She gasped.
“Mitch. Mitch Branson.”
“Thank you,” she whispered. Her soaked shirt clung to her chest as it rose and fell with every gasping breath. She was damn brave, I’d give her that. Mud streaked her cheeks. Her hair was a mess. She looked like hell. Yet she was still stunning.
I dragged my gaze away before it stuck there.
The ravine rose around us, and the sheer red canyon walls were slick with torrential rain. No way in hell were we climbing out of here. We’re gonna need help.
I checked my pocket. Son of a bitch. The satellite phone was gone.
The water was rising damn fast. We had to get to higher ground.
I scanned the slope, searching for a way out, and spotted a dark hole in the rock about ten feet up. A cave.
"See that?" I jerked my chin toward the cavity. "We need to get up there before this river swallows us."
Charlie shielded her eyes from the downpour and followed my gaze. "Okay." She nodded.
"Doug,” I yelled over the torrent. “You ready to go?"
"Go? Go where?" Doug's eyes bulged like a spooked bullock.
"To that cave up there." I pointed.
Doug groaned. "Why can't we stay here? What if we fall?"
Charlie rolled her eyes so hard I nearly laughed. "The river's rising, that's why. Let's go."
She swung her leg off the log and moved toward the riverbank, giving me a view of her long legs. Lean, strong, mighty nice to look at.
Hot damn, she’s fit.
"Doug. Move," I growled.
His gaze bounced from me to Charlie, to the cliff, and he went so pale I thought he was going to puke. He didn't move from the branch he was clinging to.
Charlie, though, was shuffling along the branch toward the slippery wall.
As much as I would have preferred to follow her sexy ass up the rocky ravine, I took the lead in case she needed a hand.
Torrential rain speared into our backs, and the thunder cracking overhead made the rocks beneath my hands shake.
We scrambled up the muddy rockface on our hands and knees, slipping and sliding as we dragged our bodies upward.
Doug half-crawled, half-scrambled, non-stop bitching.
We crawled into the cave just as another surge of floodwater thundered past below. The sharp crack of snapping wood echoed through the ravine, and I turned in time to see the tree we'd clung to moments ago rip free from the muddy bank and vanish into the torrent.
Charlie flinched at the sound. "Jesus," she breathed beside me. "Lucky we weren't still on that."
"You're not kidding," I muttered, swiping wet hair from my eyes. "Thirty seconds later, and we'd be screwed."
Sunlight slanted through the cave mouth, turning the storm outside into a shimmering blur of silver and grey. Below us, the floodwater raged, a frothing brown beast trying to break free.
We stepped back from the entrance, and the cave swallowed the worst of the storm, muffling it to a distant growl. Wind still howled across the opening, dragging curtains of rain behind it. But in here, it was almost peaceful. Almost. If not for Doug's ragged puffing like he'd ridden a bucking bull.
Charlie seemed unfazed as if she could do it all again.
The cave was bigger than I’d expected. Tall enough to stand in, wide enough for all three of us to stretch out if it came to that.
Deep, too. I couldn't see a back wall. Smooth red stone curved around us, shaped by centuries of wind and weather into a hollow that felt strangely deliberate.
As though this place had been waiting for us.
I backed up to the nearest wall and slumped down, letting the warm rock press into my spine as I caught my breath and started thinking through our next move. I yanked off my boots, poured out the water, and pulled them back on.
Charlie sagged down beside me, hugging her knees to her chest. Her sodden ponytail curled over one shoulder, the end of it sliding right into the dip of her cleavage like it had a damn mind of its own. As if I needed any help noticing what was already impossible to miss.
Doug, on the other hand, scrambled over to the far side of the cave like I was contagious. Good. The farther away he was, the better.
Charlie swiped her muddy hands down her thighs, trying to do the impossible and get them clean.
Her clothes were plastered to her curves like a second skin.
She was trembling, probably still battling adrenaline.
But hell, if she didn't look more composed than most people would after a near-death tumble through a flood.
She let out a long, shaky breath and turned those honey-colored eyes on me. "Thank you for saving me. Again."
She said it as though I was some kind of goddamn hero. I wasn't.
I just gave a grunt and fixed my gaze across the cave, not trusting myself to say anything that wouldn't resemble bullshit.
Doug finally dropped to a crouch across from me, still coughing and spitting up river water. He didn't say a damn word. He just sat there wheezing like my old man after a day of sucking on his damn cigarettes.
Charlie sat upright and wrapped her arms around her knees again. She'd been through hell, yet the look she gave Doug was pure steel. "You could say thank you, Doug."
Her voice wasn't loud, but it cut through the quiet like a whipcrack.
Doug rolled his shoulders and didn't even glance at her. "What for?"
Charlie blinked. "Excuse me?"
"You heard me," he muttered, dragging a hand down his face.
"Say thank you," she snapped, flicking her hair over her shoulder. "He risked his life to save you. You're lucky you didn't drown."
Doug's head snapped toward her, his face twisted with frustration. "We're in this mess because of you."
She stiffened. "What the hell are you talking about?"
"This dig site. You chose it, remember?"
"What does that have to do with basic decency? Say thank you, Doug."
"Fuck off," Doug snapped.
I pushed off the wall and stood. "Watch your mouth."
Doug's head jerked up. "You don't get to talk to me like that."
"Yeah, I do." I moved toward him, slowly and deliberately, my boots grinding into the grit. "You're trespassing on my land." My voice was low, calm … but I meant every damn word. I was one wrong look away from breaking his nose.
Doug scrambled to his feet as if he thought height gave him the upper hand and glared at me with the same blind fury I'd seen in my old man more times than I cared to remember.
Charlie stood, too, brushing pointlessly at the mud on her shorts. Her sharp eyes flicked from me to Doug. "That's right. What do you say about that, Doug? You told me we had a permit."
"We do," he snapped, too quickly. His voice cracked on the last word.
Charlie crossed her arms. "Do we?" Her voice wasn't loud, but it was dangerous.
Doug's mouth opened, then shut. His nostrils flared. "You don't know anything," he spat. "You never have. You just use everyone like you always do."
"What are you talking about?" Charlie's eyes widened.
"I'm the one who made this project happen." Doug glared at her as if she were roadkill.
"Then give me the truth," she demanded, stepping forward a pace. "Did we have permission or not?"
Doug's expression twisted. "Shut up, Charlie. I'm so sick of your bullshit."
She gasped, recoiling as though he’d struck her.
I straightened, hands curling into fists. "Hey, I said, watch your goddamn mouth."
Silence thickened between us. Outside, the storm gave a low, menacing growl.
Charlie exhaled, shaking her head in disbelief. "You're an asshole. I used to look up to you."
Doug turned to me with a sneer. "You don't know her. She doesn't listen, and she'll do whatever it takes to get what she wants."
Charlie pressed her fingers against her temples, pain etched across her face. "What the hell are you talking about?"
Doug flashed me a wink as if we were in some secret club together. We fucking weren't. The men I called friends didn't try to drown women to save themselves, and they sure as hell weren’t cowards.
"All those late nights …" he said, letting the words dangle like bait.
Charlie sucked in a sharp breath. "Late nights planning this excavation? What about them?"
Doug gave a theatrical eye roll, then looked pointedly at me. "She's always flirting with me. Leading me on."
Bullshit. I'd seen the way she looked at him, and it sure as hell wasn't flirting.
Charlie recoiled. "What the hell? You're delusional. I never—"
I stepped between them, filling the space, but my message was clear.
Doug backed off half a step, chest heaving. His hand shifted to the rifle strap slung over his shoulder as if reminding me he was armed.
Stupid move.
He had no idea who he was dealing with. If he so much as twitched for that weapon, I'd have him in a chokehold so fast he wouldn't remember his own damn name.
Charlie's gaze flicked to mine. Wide. Wounded. Furious. "He's lying," she said, voice raw. "He's just trying to deflect from the truth." Then she turned back to Doug, her fury hardening into resolve. "You never got a permit to excavate this land, did you?"
Doug snorted. "Now who's deflecting from the truth?"
"Answer her," I growled. "Admit you didn’t get a permit."
Doug's jaw worked. His gaze darted. That was answer enough, but I wanted to see if the coward had the balls to admit it.
Doug’s scowl deepened. "You son of a—"
"I'd watch what you say next," I cut in, my tone low and sharp. "Because you're still on my land, and I haven't even started being pissed off yet."
Doug's mouth clamped shut.
Smart.
For now.
"Doesn't matter what I say. You won't believe me.” He glared at Charlie. “Why are you taking his word over mine? You don't even know him. He could be a poacher, wanting our dinosaur bones."
Charlie's eyes flicked between us as though she was calculating which of us was more dangerous. "Are you?" she asked. "A poacher?"
"Nope." I didn't blink. Didn't flinch.
Outside, the storm roared louder.
No one spoke.
Doug prowled back and forth, boots grating on stone. Each step screamed of desperation. He was rattled, and he should be. He had no way out of this.
That made him dangerous.
With the storm just getting started, we were trapped in here together for a while.
Lightning split the sky, turning the cave mouth electric white for one blinding second.
In that flash, Charlie's fierce gaze found mine.
Doug's hand tightened on the rifle strap.
This cave just got a whole lot smaller.