Elemental Assassin 02 - Web of Lies

knowledge Finn gave me.”
    Estep_Web of Lies_1P EP.indd 202-203
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    “What do you expect to find in there?” Caine asked, could, but it still took us almost twenty minutes to reach peering through the binoculars at the structure. “I doubt the bottom.
    Tobias Dawson just leaves incriminating evidence lying We crouched behind an outcropping of rock and around.”
    peered into the flat area that stretched out before us. The I shrugged and got to my feet. I took a moment to empty, dug-out feel of the mountain reminded me of the swipe the dead, damp leaves from the knees of my jeans. Ashland Rock Quarry not too far from here. The place “Maybe, maybe not. Dawson’s the big boss around here, where Alexis James had met her death two months ago. remember? This is his mountain. He might be sloppy Donovan looked through the binoculars again. “It enough to leave things out in the open.”
    seems like everyone’s gone home already,” he murmured.
    “And if not?”
    “I don’t even think there are any guards around.”
    I shrugged again and tied one end of the rope around
    “Why would there be?” I asked. “Nobody around the base of a nearby pine tree. After I made sure it was here’s going to be dumb enough to steal from Tobias securely knotted, I tossed the rest of it down the ridge Dawson. Especially not since he’s such good friends with below us. “Then at least we’ll have gotten our exercise for Mab Monroe. Besides, even if somebody did steal somethe evening.”
    thing, he’d look a little conspicuous driving a bulldozer I reached into my back jeans pocket and held out a down into the city, now wouldn’t he?”
    pair of gloves to him. They were gardening gloves, white Caine snorted at the image, but he didn’t argue with with brown trowels on them, but they’d keep us from getmy logic. ting rope burn on our hands—or leaving fingerprints in
    “Come on,” I said. “Let’s get this over with.”
    Tobias Dawson’s office.
    We eased out from behind the rocks and walked for“Now, are you coming or not?”
    ward. The metal equipment cast out all sorts of dark, Donovan Caine let out a low curse. But the detective twisted shadows, made even murkier by the drizzle and took the gloves from me and started pulling them onto thick clouds overhead. A couple of tall, parking lot-style his hands.
    lights next to the mine entrance burned like skinny yellow lanterns. The lights made it easy enough to navigate our For whatever reason, the miners hadn’t dug out this way through the equipment maze. But the rain couldn’t side of the mountain yet, which meant the ridge was quite drown out the smell of exhaust and gasoline that still covered with rocks and gnarled vegetation. It was a hung in the air like smog.
    steep, slippery slope, made more so by the drizzle, and The stone’s murmurs grew louder and sharper the farwe moved with care, using the rope to help us walk our ther I walked into the basin, until the vibrations rang in way down the embankment. We moved as quickly as we my ears like a never-ending death wail. I gritted my teeth Estep_Web of Lies_1P EP.indd 204-205
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    and blocked out the noise. There was nothing I could do again, the first two i s in Mining had been transformed to help the stone. I just didn’t have that kind of power. into Tobias Dawson’s rune—a lit stick of dynamite. only time could do that now—if the mountain could I wore the same kind of gardening gloves Donovan ever truly recover from being so viciously brutalized. Caine did, so I had no qualms about reaching forward It took us about ten minutes of walking before we and trying the doorknob. Locked. Not a problem. I were within sight of the mine office, a small building pulled off one of my gloves and reached for my Ice magic. made out of sheet metal and fiberglass, covered up with The cold, silver light flickered over my palm, and a few whitewashed wooden boards. A couple of security lights seconds later, I had two long, slender Ice picks. Donovan glowed over the front door. I peered into the darkness, watched me work with a mixture of curiosity and resignabut I didn’t see any guards patrolling around the building. tion. Less than a minute later, the lock slid home, and the If Tobias Dawson did have a night shift, they’d probably door opened.
    be farther up around the curve in the basin, stationed at I threw the