Ghost Hunter

Chapter 39

THE FREQUENCY OF ELLY'S AMBER DISAPPEARED FROM Cooper's personal amber-rez locator. He went cold to the bone. He did not want to think about what that might mean.

All he had now were the coordinates of Elly's last position in the catacombs. If she and Doreen moved very far from those, he would never find them.

But he was close. And Rose was with the women, he reminded himself. According to Emmett London, dust bunnies seemed to be able to navigate underground. Rose would never abandon Elly. Not if she was still alive.

He refused to contemplate the alternative.

He sent the sled skimming across a six-way intersection and shot down another glowing hallway, heading for Elly's last known location.

*****

ELLY CROUCHED JUST INSIDE THE SMALL CAVE. PEERING through the screen of ferns. Doreen knelt beside her. Rose sat on a nearby rock, fully fluffed, looking unconcerned once more. She fussed with her fur and fastidiously adjusted her necklace.

Jordan's Jungle was a surprisingly noisy place. They hadn't seen any wildlife except for a few small, very green lizards skittering over the nearby rocks, but the shrieks of unseen birds echoed through the high tree canopy.

Down below the cavern where she and Doreen hid, a large waterfall cascaded over stones, splashing into a dark pool that was covered with broad-leaved plants.

Layer upon layer of lush, thick greenery surrounded the grotto. From her vantage point, Elly could see the opening in the wall that she had created and a small section of the outside corridor.

"What's he doing?" Doreen whispered. "Can you see?"

A figure moved hesitantly through the opening and stopped almost immediately. Palmer looked around in obvious confusion and disbelief.

"He's inside," Elly said. "But he looks very nervous."

"I don't blame him." Doreen shuddered. "Who knows what's in this place? I'll bet there are all kinds of poisonous snakes and insects."

"Rose will give us a warning if something dangerous approaches."

"Fine. We get a warning. Then what? It's not like we've got anything we can use against that blue ghost light thing."

"I wonder how Palmer got my amber frequency," Elly said. "How did he even know I had one? No one except Cooper and my family know that I have some kind of psi thing going on with plants. Why would he suspect that I was wearing tuned amber?"

"I think we can worry about that later. Right now we've got other issues."

"Elly," Palmer shouted. His voice reverberated through the trees. "You are in great danger. Doreen and Cooper Boone are partners in the drug ring. Don't you get it? They're trying to set you up."

"I can't believe he's going to try a stupid line like that," Elly stated. "He must have a very low opinion of my intelligence."

"Palmer hasn't got a lot of respect for women," Doreen said. "And I'll have to admit I did my part to encourage that view."

"Don't blame yourself for not seeing through him," Elly said. "He's a very shrewd and manipulative man. He actually managed to get himself a seat on the Guild Council back home in Aurora Springs. That means he fooled my father and everyone else on the Council. No one realized just how dangerous he was until Cooper arrived on the scene. He understood right away that Palmer was a threat and took steps to remove him."

"Yeah? Too bad Cooper didn't do something a little more permanent."

"Got a hunch Cooper is thinking pretty much the same thing at this very moment."

*****

SHOULD HAVE KILLED THE BASTARD, OR AT LEAST FRIED HIS brains when I had the chance.

Cooper brought Bertha's sled to a halt behind the one Frazier had left in the hallway. He got out and went swiftly toward the opening in the wall.

The sight of the massed greenery was stunning. Looks like a full-blown rainforest in there. So much for Jordan's Jungle being a myth.

He stopped at the edge of the opening, flattening his back against the wall, and inhaled the heavy scents of the jungle. The humidity was an invisible wall of heat. He could hear the cries of birds and the distant rumble of a waterfall.

Palmer Frazier's voice rang out.

"Elly, you've got to listen to me. Cooper Boone is a very dangerous man. You grew up in a Guild family. Ever heard of a blue freak? That's what he is. I can protect you from him."

Cooper listened intently. If Elly was in there, she knew enough to keep silent. As for Frazier, he wasn't too far inside the entrance.

"I know all about your ability to sense plant psi," Frazier said. "Griggs figured it out. When he visited your shop he watched you working with the herbs and realized that you could do the same thing he could do with plants. A couple of weeks ago I sent him into your shop with one of the new amber frequency readers to get a reading on your earrings. Those new gadgets are really something. All he had to do was stand a few feet away from you. He was able to get your number without you ever knowing what he was doing. It was just a safety precaution to protect you in case Boone kidnapped you and took you underground."

Cooper rezzed blue ghost light, forcing it into a vortex. Using the blue storm as a shield, he moved through the opening.

He saw motion in a heavy stand of monstrous ferns not more than twenty feet away. Frazier was sticking close to the gate in the wall, no doubt afraid to move too deeply into the unknowns of the jungle.

The storm of blue energy caught Frazier's attention.

"Boone." He pushed through a fan of giant fern fronds. "You son of a bitch freak. This is all your fault."

A blue vortex flashed across the space that separated them. It struck the shield that Cooper had constructed. When the energy masses collided there was a brilliant, intense explosion of blue light that briefly lit up the primal darkness of the underground rain forest.

Another vortex arrow followed, and then another and another, until the air was filled with violent shafts of energy. Frazier was going for an all-out assault, hoping to overwhelm and disorient his opponent.

Cooper's shield flared and pulsed in response to the hail of arrows. The strobe light flashes became so intense, so eye-dazzling, that Cooper had to close his eyes and fight with only his psi senses to guide him.

Somewhere in the vast reaches of the jungle, creatures shrieked and screamed in warning and panic. Cooper heard a wild, chaotic fluttering of heavy wings.

Rain started to fall. He heard it first because it pounded against the canopy of tree leaves, creating a dull roar of noise. Then the water began to penetrate the leafy ceiling. It descended in a steady, unyielding torrent, drenching him. When he opened his eyes, he discovered that the mist created by the deluge was so heavy he could not see more than a few feet.

If he was half-blind now, so was Frazier. The only thing giving away their positions to each other was the luminous ghost energy they used as weapons.

He stopped pulsing power through amber and moved quickly into the nearest stand of trees.

Suddenly aware that he no longer had a target, Frazier ceased the barrage of energy arrows.

"You're a dead freak, Boone," Frazier screamed. "Do you hear me? You're dead. When this is over, the Aurora Springs Guild is going to be my private property. And so is your handpicked woman. I'm going to screw her as often as I like, and she's going to smile at me when I do it, because if she doesn't, I'll destroy her whole damn family. Just like I'm going to destroy your family, Boone. Got to save innocent people from blue freaks like you now, don't we? It's a prime responsibility of the Guild."

Cooper watched the little sparks of blue popping and snapping a short distance away. They were the only things he could see through the steady downpour. Frazier was so out of control he didn't even realize he was summoning the stray bits of blue ghost light, didn't realize that he was giving away his position.

Cooper pulled all of the energy he could out of the atmosphere and sent it smashing into the epicenter of the dancing blue lights.

He knew he had found his target when he heard Frazier scream. The shriek of pain and rage and fear seemed to go on for an eternity.

It ended with a shattering abruptness.

Cooper walked through the driving rain to the place where he had last seen the flickers of ghost light.

Frazier was sprawled on his back, his mouth open, dead eyes wide.

Cooper crouched to check for a pulse. There wasn't any. He rose.

"Elly?"

"We're up here," she shouted from somewhere off to his right. "Be down in a minute."

Rose reached him first. He heard the dust bunny's cheerful chortle before he saw her. She tumbled toward him through the rain, her wet fur plastered to her small, sleek frame. A bracelet fashioned of green and yellow stones swung from her neck.

He reached down to pick her up. "Lookin' good, gorgeous."

Elly emerged from the trees, Doreen right behind her. Both women were soaked to the skin.

The steely tension that had been driving him for the past half hour finally began to ease. Elly was safe.

Then he got a closer look at Doreen's face.

"What the hell happened to you?" he asked.

"Long story." Doreen looked at Frazier's body. "Is he dead?"

"Yes," Cooper said.

"Excellent," Doreen said, supremely satisfied.

Elly hurled herself against him.

"I was scared to death when I saw all that blue ghost fire," she whispered. She tightened her arms around him as though she would never let him go. "Are you all right?"

"Yes. What about you?"

"I'm okay. Rose saved us by showing us the gate into this place."

"Let's save the explanations until later, okay?" Doreen urged them toward the opening in the wall. "We've got to get aboveground as fast as possible so that we can claim the most important underground discovery made since the First Generation settlers found the catacombs."

Elly pushed herself slightly away from Cooper. "You know something? You're right."

"Yep. And there's another thing here." Doreen winked one bruised eye. "At this point, as far as anyone knows, you, my friend, are the only person who can open and close that gate over there. If we play our cards right, this rain forest is going to make us all very, very rich. I suggest we hustle."

Elly laughed. "You do realize that we're going to have to share this find with Bertha Newell?"

"No problem," Doreen said, urging them toward the opening. "There will be plenty of money to go around. Elly, you'd better close up that opening in the wall after we leave. Don't want to take the chance that some other ruin rats will stumble into this jungle before we file our claim."

"All right," Elly agreed. She caught Cooper's hand.

Cooper looked at both of them. "Hate to rain on your parade, seeing that you're both already soaked and all, but we're going to have to deal with the cops before you can start in on the paperwork you'll need to file your claim on the jungle. We've got a dead body here."

Elly made a face. "And a famous detective who is sort of passed out on my kitchen floor. That will probably take a little explaining."

"No problem," Cooper said. "I'm a Guild boss, remember? I handle stuff like this."

Doreen frowned, suddenly looking distinctly wary. "That was quite a light show you put on in there. I'm guessing you probably melted amber."

"Mmm," Cooper said.

"Are you going to go out of control and turn weird on us before we get to the surface?" Doreen asked.

"Don't be silly," Elly said. Her hand tightened around Cooper's. "Guild bosses don't go out of control and turn weird."

"Not unless we're provoked," Cooper said.